Читать книгу The Christmas Strike - Nikki Rivers - Страница 11

Through the kind of sobbing that turns into hiccups, Gwen told me that she’d just found out that David never loved her.

“He doesn’t want to be with me, Mom,” she wailed as I took her into my arms.

“Baby, I’m sure David loves you. He’s always loved you,” I said.

She shook her head vigorously. “No. I just fit some kind of ideal that he wanted in a wife. It’s not me he loves. It’s his work. I was just—just arm candy!”

A tiny pinprick of guilt poked at me. I’d so recently wondered the same thing about Gwen’s feelings toward David and now here she was, my brokenhearted daughter, feeling loved only for her facade.

“Oh, my God. What happened?” Natalie said from the doorway.

“David doesn’t love me,” Gwen blubbered.

Natalie shoved her hands deep into the pockets of her jeans as she came all the way into the room. “Oh, come on. We all know David is nuts about you.”

Gwen sobbed more. “I don’t think he’s ever really loved me.”

Compassion was one of Natalie’s more endearing qualities, but she didn’t usually waste it on her sister. Now it warmed my heart to see Nat take her hand out of her pocket to smooth Gwen’s long, expensively maintained, blond hair back from her face. “Come on. Tell us what happened.”

“I just feel so betrayed,” she said in a shaky voice.

Over her sister’s head, Natalie mouthed the question affair?

I shrugged, but, given how crazy David had always been about Gwen, I thought it highly unlikely and I wasn’t going to ask. Not now, anyway.

Natalie had no such compunction. “Did he cheat on you?” she asked.

The question brought Gwen’s head up with a jerk. “What? Of course not. Why would he cheat on me?”

“Then what happened, for heaven’s sake?” I asked, starting to lose patience.

Nat stepped closer to Gwen and put her arm around her shoulders. I hadn’t seen them present anything like a united front since they’d both campaigned to skip school to go to a rock concert in Chicago when they’d been sixteen and seventeen.

Gwen, always the more delicate looking of the two, was only five six to Nat’s five ten. She easily leaned her head on Nat’s shoulder and gave a long, shaky sigh. “He—” she sniffed “—he canceled our cruise!” she finished with a wail.

Nat leaped away from her like she was going for the long jump in the Olympics.

“What?” she bellowed.

“He canceled our Christmas cruise because of some project that’s in trouble. He’s so selfish. That’s all he thinks about is work. I spent months shopping for just the right clothes and then he—”

“Wait just a minute,” Nat demanded, putting her fisted hands on her hips. “You’re pulling this scene because your cruise was canceled?”

“You don’t understand. We haven’t been on a trip since our honeymoon in Hawaii last spring.”

“Aw—that’s real rough,” Natalie said, her compassion morphing quickly into ridicule. “Boo-hoo.”

“Nat,” I warned.

“You don’t know what it’s been like,” Gwen shrieked, totally undeterred by her sister’s mocking. “He works all the time. We haven’t even been out to dinner in over a week.”

“Oh, really,” Nat said as she cocked her hip out aggressively and crossed her arms over her chest. She’d been taking the same stance since she was just a toddler. Right after Charlie was killed, the smart-ass started to sprout out of her like someone had fed her liquid fertilizer. “My heart bleeds. Too bad Jeremy’s unemployment ran out or we could take you to McDonald’s for a Happy Meal.”

Gwen abruptly stopped crying. “I simply will not take this kind of attitude from you,” Gwen said with all the dignity of a royal. “Not when you’re taking advantage of Mother the way you are.”

Natalie shifted her weight to the other hip. “Excuse me?”

“She’s practically ready for retirement and your whole family is living off of her,” Gwen told her.

Ready for retirement? I was fifty-two. There was still time. I could still buy a pair of leather jeans and go out and get a life.

“Mom invited us to move in—and we pay our own way as much as possible,” Nat said. “It’s not Jeremy’s fault he’s out of work, you know.”

I could see that Gwen was winding up for a retort that would wound. It was time for some mommy intervention.

“Okay, girls, enough!” I yelled. “Everybody has problems. And everyone’s problems are important—if only to themselves. So let’s show each other a little respect.”

Natalie looked even more sullen, as she always did when she knew I’d hit the mark. Gwen sniffed and started crying silently. The phrase award-winning performance did come to mind. But still, she’d just left her husband. Being self-absorbed didn’t mean you were protected from pain.

“Gwen, honey,” I gently asked her, “are you sure this is what you want?”

“What she wants is for David to come running up here and beg her to come back to him,” Nat said. “Oh, and maybe buy her another hunk of expensive jewelry.”

“Natalie,” I said sternly, even though I knew there might be more than a kernel of truth in that statement. “Please.”

“You can be such a bitch,” Gwen said before she blew her nose loudly into a big wad of tissues she’d pulled from her Dooney & Bourke handbag.

“Look, I’m stuck here living under Ma’s roof again, trying to hold it together with three kids and an out-of-work husband. And you’ve got the nerve to come in here crying because David had to cancel your cruise? Give me a break.”

Maybe Natalie was saying all the things to her sister that I wish I had the guts to say but I was too busy thinking about Nat’s choice of the word stuck. Is that how she felt living with me? I knew it wasn’t an ideal situation, but still the word stuck—well, it hurt, damn it.

“Mother, are you just going to stand there and let her talk to me that way?” Gwen demanded.

Right now I wasn’t sure what was upsetting me the most. Gwen’s self-absorption or Natalie’s anger. I searched for the right words to say. “You know, Gwen, Nat’s going through a hard time right now,” I began.

Gwen dashed tears from her cheeks with an angry swipe of her hand. “Like I’m not? At least she knows where her husband is.”

There was a burp from the doorway. We all looked up. Jeremy stood there, bleary-eyed, scratching his stomach with one hand and brushing his hair back with the other. “Did I miss dinner?” he croaked in a sleep-roughened voice.

“Oh, good,” Gwen said, recovering rather quickly from her last outburst. “I’m glad you’re here. I need help with my bags. If you’ll follow me—”

“You bet, princess,” Jeremy said as he rolled his eyes at us before following her.

“Look at that,” Nat muttered. “She’s taking over already.”

“Nat, come on. Gwen is hurting.”

“I’ll tell you what Gwen is doing. She’s finding a new way to make Christmas all about her. Like the time she had the chicken pox. Or the time she broke up with that guy she thought she was so in love with. She spent the entire holiday season crying her eyes out and refusing to eat. By the time Christmas break was over, she had a new boyfriend and claimed she’d never been so in love in her life. She does this kind of stuff on holidays, Ma. Haven’t you noticed?”

Did she? I knew Gwen could be manipulative and maybe just a touch narcissistic. But chicken pox? “Nat, I don’t think even Gwen could will herself to get the chicken pox.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Nat said as she headed for the front hall. Seconds later she yelled, “Hey, Ma! You gotta come and see this!”

There turned out to be ten pieces of luggage. All matched. Pink crocodile. It made quite an impressive pile in the hallway. I was a little impressed to see Jeremy actually breaking a sweat for a change, too, as he hauled it all in.

“Last one,” he said as he rolled in a suitcase big enough to hold a drum set.

“Mother, which room will be mine?” Gwen asked.

“Well, the only room free is the guest room off the kitchen.”

“That’ll never do,” Gwen said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “It’s barely big enough for my clothes.”

“Well, you’re not getting our room,” Natalie said.

I totally agreed. It would really be starting off on the wrong foot to kick Nat and Jeremy out of the second largest bedroom in the house to give it to Gwen. And we certainly couldn’t have any of the children sleeping downstairs by themselves. So that left—

Me.

“I’ll take the guest room, Gwen. You can have my room.”

Gwen took it like it was her due. “Jeremy?” she said, then picked up the smallest case and started up the stairs.

“If she offers me a tip,” Jeremy muttered, “I’ll kick her in her bony ass.”

“Let’s all help with the luggage,” I hastened to suggest, grabbing a suitcase and starting up before anyone could argue with me.

Later that night, as I lay in the narrow single bed in what my mother had always referred to as the maid’s room even though we’d never had a maid, I could hear Nat and Gwen bickering over the bathroom and, just like that, fifteen years peeled back. It was worse than déjà vu. I mean, I was actually going through it for the second time. But I had been younger the first time, I said to myself as I rolled over and pulled a pillow over my head.

I was feeling a little used and abused. And a whole lot sorry for myself. So Nat felt stuck. How did she think I felt? Did she think this was the life I’d planned to be living when I reached my present age? And Gwen was acting like a child throwing a tantrum. And even though I felt like kicking her in her bony ass myself, I had to be supportive, didn’t I? Wasn’t that part of the deal that came with motherhood?

Frankly, I wasn’t feeling all that supportive of either of my daughters right now. I’d been a widow already by the time I was Gwen’s age. At least she still had a husband who would eventually take her on a cruise. And Nat had Jeremy and the kids. I flopped onto my back again and tossed the pillow aside. The problem was, I wasn’t supposed to be alone in this bed mulling over all this stuff by myself. Charlie was supposed to be here with me. To talk to. To hold me if I cried. To laugh with me over the absurdity of life. Was the restlessness I’d been feeling just a newly resurrected anger at the injustice of it all?

Charlie, always a careful driver, had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. He’d been on his way home to us from a conference in Green Bay when a semi had gone over the center line. It had happened too fast for Charlie to even react, the police had told me. I could hear the words like they were said just yesterday. “It’s likely he never knew what hit him, ma’am,” the cop had assured me.

Well, I knew what had hit me. Widowhood. Single motherhood. It was as if my life as me, Abby, had just stopped. By now, at the age of fifty-two, I’d thought I’d have Abby back again. But as I listened to the girls still squabbling overhead I knew that my time wasn’t arriving anytime soon. In fact, I was pretty sure the train hadn’t even left the station yet.

“Look,” I said the next morning after listening to my daughters complain about the house having only one bathroom, “we’re just going to have to start making a schedule for the bathroom in the morning and at night.”

“We were here first,” Natalie said tightly. “Let her go to a hotel. She can afford it.”

“That’s not fair! My marriage is crumbling and you want me to go to a hotel? Why shouldn’t Mother be here for me, too?”

“Yeah, your marriage is crumbling because your husband put off a trip to the Bahamas to make another million. Excuse me while I don’t cry.”

“You are such a bitch!”

“Hey—little pitchers,” Nat said sternly as she nodded toward her trio of minors. They were watching the sisters with their mouths dropped open nearly to the table.

Suddenly, Ashley jumped from her chair and ran up to me to clutch my leg. “Why are they yelling?” she whispered as she peered anxiously up at me. “Do Mommy and Auntie Gwen hate each other?”

I smoothed her hair back from her little concerned face. “Do you hate your brothers when you yell at them?”

Ashley solemnly shook her head. “Not really.”

“Then I guess your mommy and your auntie are just acting like children.”

“Would it kill anyone to try to see my side of things, here?” Gwen demanded before she flounced out of the room.

By now the kitchen table was a mess of cereal, spilled milk and whatever other chaos grade school children can cause in a kitchen on a Saturday morning. I went over to the sink and turned on the faucet, waiting for the water in the old pipes to get hot. The kids must have sensed more trouble brewing because they soon drifted off to wreak havoc in the living room.

I shot Nat a look. “You know, you’re not helping matters any.”

She had the grace to look shamefaced, something that always raised patches of bright red on her pale cheeks. “I’m sorry. I guess it’s just that after losing your house it’s a little hard to have sympathy for someone who has to postpone a cruise.”

I put my arm around her shoulders. “Honey, I know. But this is still real to her. She feels let down by her husband. She feels—”

“Abandoned,” Natalie finished for me. “I know. But she’s not the only one who lost her father, you know.”

I squeezed her shoulder. “We all deal with things differently, Nat.” Was now the time to reminded her of her overprotective-ness of Jeremy? Probably not, I decided.

“Mother?”

Gwen had quietly come back into the kitchen. In her long rose-sprigged flannel nightgown with matching robe, her hair in a tangled mess and her eyes red from crying, she looked so much like the girl she’d once been. So when she asked in a small, plaintive voice, “Would you make me some pancakes?” I, naturally, said yes.

She smiled weakly. “I’ll have them in my room.”

“Oh, brother,” said Natalie.

“So you’re late for the Prisoners of Willow Creek Enrichment Society outing because you were serving your daughter pancakes in bed?” Iris asked. “Your thirty-year-old daughter, I might add.”

I grimaced. “You might, but I wish you wouldn’t.”

Iris dipped the tip of her brush in pink paint. “Aren’t we supposed to be escaping our bondage?”

“Yes, of course—”

“Well, I’m seeing you pretty tethered to the ground, honey,” Iris said.

“Well, what am I supposed to do?”

“Kick them out on their asses and tell them to grow up?” Iris suggested tenderly.

“It’s just not that easy,” I whined.

“Oh, don’t pay any attention to her,” Jo said. “She’s never had kids.”

“Making me the smartest woman at this table,” Iris stated.

We’d driven an hour in the snow to sit in the back room of an overheated ceramics shop and paint designs on large coffee cups. I was starting to think that none of the women at this table were very smart.

“This is a stupid way to spend a Saturday,” I blurted out.

Some women at the advanced class’s table who were working on painting little elves swung their heads our way, their faces registering disapproval.

“You trying to get us beat up or something?” Jo hissed.

“They do look a little hard-core,” Iris said.

I started to giggle at the thought of hard-core ceramic junkies. More disapproving looks came our way. I wasn’t sure if it was our conversation or the fact that none of us was wearing a sweatshirt with a barnyard animal, a snowman or sprigs of holly on it.

“Why do I get the feeling,” Jo said out of the corner of her mouth, “that we’re about to get kicked out of here?”

“Just as long as we don’t have to serve detention,” I said.

Iris threw down her paintbrush. “Let’s get the hell out of here. I want a margarita.”

There was a small gasp from a chubby woman at the next table, who was wearing a sweatshirt that featured a row of geese, each with a red ribbon tied in a bow at its throat.

“What’s the matter, lady, would you rather have a rum and Coke?”

“Well, I never—” the woman said.

“Yeah, I’m betting you haven’t,” Iris quipped.

“I think now is the time to leave,” Jo said.

I didn’t argue.

Amid much giggling, we left our half-finished latte mugs where they were, went up front, paid what we owed and headed back to Willow Creek and the only Mexican restaurant in the area.

I ordered a regular margarita on the rocks, no salt, Jo ordered a blended strawberry one and Iris, skipping the niceties, ordered a double shot of tequila.

We were as different as our drink orders—Jo, Iris and I. Always had been.

Jo, the tomboy and the first of us to date, had been on the girls’ hockey team in high school. She was the kind of girl who joined in a game of football with the guys at the park on Saturday afternoons, thus getting to know all the jocks and giving her the inside dating edge. Iris’s high school claim to fame was getting caught smoking in the girls’ room more often than any other girl of the graduating class of 1972. I was the studious, practical one. The one on the debating team. The one who usually followed all the rules.

The unlikely friendship had started when we’d all refused to dissect a frog in freshman biology. We’d all gotten detention as punishment for our stand on animal cruelty. Although I’ve secretly always felt that with Iris, it was more of a stand against the smell of formaldehyde. Jo and I, clearly out of our element, had glued ourselves to Iris, who was more than familiar with the drill and who was friends with nearly every scary boy in the detention room. Afterwards, we’d walked home in the dark together—it had been late fall and the smell of burning leaves had been in the air—griping about the unfairness of the world. We’d been best friends ever since.

“These chips are stale,” Iris complained as she threw a half-eaten one back into the complimentary basket.

“The chips are always stale,” Jo pointed out. “It’s their way of getting you to order something.”

“You guys want to split the fajitas?”

Jo and I agreed and we put in the order when our drinks were delivered.

Iris licked the back of her hand, sprinkled salt on it, licked again, threw back the double shot, then sucked a wedge of lime. This ritual never failed to fascinate Jo and me. We watched in admiration as we sat there sipping our gentile margaritas.

“You know,” Iris said as she licked salt from her lips, “if the Prisoners Society doesn’t start getting more exciting, we’re going to need to form a society against the damned society.”

Jo sighed. “Okay, so the ceramics didn’t work out. So sue me.”

“Maybe we should start planning another trip to Europe,” Iris suggested, “while our passports are still good.”

Jo shook her head. “I’m saving every dime I can get my hands on for the diner so when I get Mike to see things my way, I’ll be ready.”

“Fat chance I’m going anywhere soon, either,” I put in. “I’ve got a full house. I bet they’re all waiting at home right now wondering what’s for dinner.”

“Damn,” Iris said, “how can you stand it? That’s the main reason I’ve never wanted to get married, you know. The idea of being needed all the time like that—” She gave an exaggerated shiver of distaste.

I’d never really considered the concept of not being needed. What would that feel like? Right now I thought it would probably feel pretty damn good. But it might have just been the margarita.

“I’m starting to get depressed,” Iris muttered. “I think it’s time we did our ritualistic toast thingy again.”

We’d started the toast—really a promise to each other—the year we’d had to cancel the trip to Europe. There was no clear anniversary date for the ritual. We generally hauled it out whenever any of us was having a bad time. It was a way of reminding ourselves that things were still possible.

Iris signaled our server for another round. When it came, we raised our various concoctions and clinked our mismatched glasses and repeated the promise. If one of us ever made it to Europe, we would toast the others out loud so at least our names would have been said there. If it was Rome, it would be wine. And if it was Paris, champagne, of course. Italy and France were the two countries we all agreed that we wanted to see.

“Hey, why don’t you come up to Milwaukee with me next weekend?” Iris suggested after she’d finished her tequila ritual. “That guy I met last time finally called me. We’re going dancing at a club downtown. I’m sure he’s got a friend we could double with.”

Jo groaned. “Milwaukee just doesn’t sound as exotic as Rome.”

Iris sniffed and straightened her shoulders. “Well, we don’t all have a still semihunky husband to cuddle up to on Friday night.”

“Sorry,” Jo said.

Iris turned to me. “How about it?”

“No way,” I said emphatically.

“Hey, you had fun that one time you came with me.”

Fun wasn’t what I’d call it. Okay, maybe at the time it had seemed like an adventure. But afterwards I just worried about whether I’d caught anything or if I was going to turn into a slut. That was over five years ago. I haven’t had sex since. And I had no intention of having it again anytime soon.

“You’re forgetting how paranoid I got afterwards,” I said.

Iris made a face. “That’s right. Forget it. I couldn’t go through that again. Guess you’ll have to find some other way to blow off steam.”

Our fajitas came and we got busy divvying up the tortillas and sizzling platters of meat and vegetables. A guy in cowboy boots slid from his stool at the bar and ambled over to the jukebox.

“Oh, oh,” Jo said, “I’m feeling some Patsy Cline comin’ on.”

But it wasn’t Patsy Cline that came out after he’d stuck in his dollar.

“Hey, wasn’t that our junior prom theme?” Iris asked as a song by the pop group Bread began to play.

But I was already there. I couldn’t even see the face of the boy I went with or remember the color of the dress. But the same feeling I’d had then washed over me now. Excitement. Possibilities. A world at our feet.

I should have known after the evening’s infamous punch incident that things weren’t going to turn out as I’d planned.

I’d learned that the only thing you could really count on was getting old. Sure, fifty-two isn’t old. But it’s a lot older than forty-two, which is a lot older than thirty-two, which is a lot older than twenty-two. What if you didn’t feel that old inside though? Lately I’d been wondering if my insides were keeping pace with my outsides. Like sometimes, inside, I’m still twenty-two. And then I pass a mirror or a plate-glass window and am shocked at the person looking back at me. Not that I look all that bad. My skin is still decent, although, like I said, those laugh lines are getting deeper. My hair is still more blond than silver. I weigh only a few pounds more than I did when I married Charlie. But I sure didn’t look like the kind of woman who had something bubbling inside of me, still waiting to break free. And I sure didn’t look like the kid I was feeling like right now, half buzzed from a couple of margaritas and the beat of a song that, until this moment, I’d forgotten all about.

When I got home that night, sure enough, the first question I got asked was what was for supper. It was nearly seven o’clock and it hadn’t occurred to any of the other adults in the house to fix something.

“I’ve already eaten,” I said.

They all looked shocked.

“But what about us?” Ashley asked.

I squatted down in front of her. “You know what, Ash? Your mom knows how to cook, too. Don’t you remember?”

Ashley nodded enthusiastically. “She makes the best tuna casserole.”

“Oh, yum,” Gwen commented from where she was half reclined on one of the sofas. “Why don’t we just open a can of SPAM?”

“Yes. Why don’t you?” I suggested. “I’ve got some work to do.”

I refused to look back to see what kind of impact my statement had on them. I just kept walking until I’d crossed the living room and opened the door to my office, careful to shut it quietly behind me.

My office was in a small second parlor off the back of the living room. It had a bow window that looked out onto the backyard and an old oak desk and chair I’d found at an estate sale and refinished. There were two small upholstered chairs for clients, a wall lined with file cabinets and an oval braided rug on the floor. I didn’t want to be too cutesy—after all I did people’s tax returns, kept their books, made out payrolls for some of the small businesses around town—so I’d replaced my mother’s lace curtains with miniblinds and the needlepoint on the walls with pieces done by regional artists.

Numbers were one of the things that had saved my sanity after Charlie had been killed. I’d had to focus on something. And we’d needed money. Charlie’s business had barely begun. He’d left me with more bills than anything. I knew that part of the reason that Gwen was so self-absorbed and Natalie was so defiant was because there had never seemed to be enough of me to go around when they’d needed me the most. I’d never claimed to be the perfect mother. But I’d given what I could. Done as much as I could. And I have ever since.

I sat down in my desk chair and leaned back. I felt drained. As if soon there wouldn’t be anything left to give.

There was the sound of a skirmish outside my office door. Matt and Tyler, fighting again. I started to stand up but forced myself to sit. There were three adults out there. They could handle it. I looked nervously at the door. Couldn’t they?

I turned on my computer and logged in to Ivan Mueller’s account. Ivan insisted on keeping old-fashioned ledgers with handwritten entries. So once a month, I stopped by his jewelry store, picked up his ledgers and transferred everything into a spreadsheet on my computer. I hoped that the familiar comfort of the numbers would keep my butt in the chair.

I didn’t leave my office that night until I was fairly certain, from the sound of things, that everyone had gone to bed for the night. Then I crept into the kitchen, grabbed a hunk of cheese from the refrigerator to stave off hunger pangs and went to bed in the maid’s room.

Believe me, the irony of the name my mother had dubbed it all those years ago was not lost on me.

The next day, I had become Gwen’s personal maid, spending a good portion of my time fielding phone messages between her and David.

“Did you tell her what I said?” he asked me anxiously during our latest chat.

“Yes, David. I told her exactly what you said. That you were sorry and were going to make it up to her.”

“What was her reaction?”

Was I really supposed to tell him that she’d opened up the latest copy of Vanity Fair and hadn’t said a word? “She’s upset, David. Why don’t you just let it go for today?”

It was his sixth call and I was, frankly, worn out. Gwen refused to take her husband’s calls but as soon as I hung up the phone she’d call me from her bedroom upstairs, wanting to know what he’d said. I’d been up and down the stairs so many times I was getting jet lag.

“All right.” The poor guy sounded both defeated and deflated. “If you’re sure that’s what she wants.”

I assured him it was, told him to hang in there and hung up.

“Mother!”

It was uncanny how Gwen always knew the minute I hung up the phone. I ran up the stairs and arrived at her room, breathless.

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him to give up for the day.”

She sat up straighter in bed. “What? You mean you told him to stop calling?”

I leaned against the door jam. “Basically, yeah. I mean, you don’t want to speak to him anyway. So what’s the point in his continuing to call?”

“But how can I make him suffer if he doesn’t keep calling so I can refuse to speak to him?”

“Gwen, he’s suffering enough already. And if that’s what this is about—”

She shrank back into the covers and got a pouty look on her face. “No—of course not. I’m just not happy with him. Not like I thought I’d be.”

“Life sucks sometimes, baby. What can I say?”

She slid her gaze in my direction, then immediately looked away. “You could say that I deserve to be happy.”

I walked from the door frame to sit at the foot of the bed, patting her ankle over the covers. “Of course you deserve to be happy, Gwen. But maybe you need to adjust what your idea of happiness is.”

“Oh, I should have known you’d take his side,” she said, rolling so that her back was to me.

I raised my eyes to the ceiling and asked the floral wallpaper border to give me the strength to resist the urge to tell her she was acting like a baby. The room was still decorated with the blue-and-white striped wallpaper I’d hung when Charlie and I had taken over the room after my mother’s death. The same white tieback curtains hung at the windows.

“I’m not taking sides,” I said. “But I think taking David’s calls would be the…ah…mature thing to do, don’t you?”

Her back still to me, she shook her head. “Why should I be mature when he’s not living up to his promises?”

“But he made promises to clients, too, Gwen. Maybe it’d be easier for you to understand if you went back to work.”

She sat up straight in bed. “Has David said anything? Did he tell you that he thinks I quit my job too soon?”

“No, of course not. It’s just that, if you don’t have enough to do, maybe—”

“But I’d have enough to do if David had time for me!”

“Baby, it’s hard to build up a business and a reputation. You’ve got to try to be understanding—to think of what it will mean for your future.”

“Oh—so when I’m too old to look fabulous in a bikini that’s when he’ll have the time to take me on a cruise?”

Yes, Nat had been the rebellious one, but Gwen had been the demanding one. The one who wanted everything right now. She seemed only capable of seeing any situation for how it affected her. I shook my head. How could I have raised two such different daughters?

I sighed. “Are you coming down for dinner?”

“I’d rather just have a tray in my room if you don’t mind.”

I decided the extra trips up and down the stairs were worth not having her at the same table with Natalie. I wasn’t sure there were enough antacids in the entire town to take care of the indigestion that might cause.

By Monday I couldn’t wait to take Ivan Mueller’s ledgers back to him. After which I planned to drive out to the discount store on the highway and get some Christmas shopping done. It was the last thing I felt like doing. My holiday spirit was still limping along like a wounded animal. But it would keep me out of the house long enough for Gwen to maybe answer one of David’s calls herself. Maybe if they talked—really talked—David would get through to her. I certainly hadn’t had any luck so far.

Ivan was his usual affable self.

“There’s my beauty of a bookkeeper,” he said when he looked up at the sound of the bell above the door. “And how was your weekend?”

“I’ve had better,” I answered ruefully.

He put his palm to his chest. “No! You are unhappy about something during this happy time of year?”

Ivan had come to the United States in the late forties. He didn’t really have an accent, but he had a courtly way of speaking that was very old world. He was short and still wore suits he’d probably had custom made in the early fifties—pin-stripes and lapels a little too wide, but the fabric excellent. He wore rimless glasses and kept his thinning hair in place with something oily. Probably the same product he’d used when he bought the suits.

He had exquisite taste in jewelry, much of it he’d designed himself. Most Willow Creek couples had exchanged their vows over Ivan’s rings. I couldn’t really afford to be a customer but he regularly gave me earrings for Christmas. And I treasured every pair.

“My kids are going through a rough time, Ivan. Things ain’t pretty at my house.”

“I am sorry to hear this. I have just the thing that will cheer you up,” he said. “Made for a special customer. Wait until you see.”

I watched him toddle off to the back room then started to gaze at the cases of jewelry. Maybe I’d skip the discount store and just get each of the girls a pendant or something this year. Ivan had some beautiful ones. But Gwen already had better than anything I could afford and Natalie wasn’t much into jewelry. Not the real thing, anyway. She’d find the cash more useful.

Ivan returned shuffling along, with a long, narrow black velvet case in his hand. He motioned me over to the counter and opened the case. I’ve never considered myself a diamond kind of gal. They didn’t fit into my lifestyle, nor could I afford them. But when Ivan revealed the gorgeous diamond-and-gold bracelet reclining inside, I experienced the same feeling I had when I’d heard that song on the jukebox. Possibilities or maybe dreams that hadn’t quite died—something that had only been a shadow of a notion up until now—still trying to break free inside of me.

“You like?” Ivan asked.

“It’s—well, it’s just the most beautiful bracelet I’ve ever seen.”

“Here. You try it on,” he said.

“No, I couldn’t—well, maybe—”

He was already clipping it around my wrist.

“Those are perfectly matched brilliant-cut rounds. Oh—” he shook his head slowly, importantly “—very, very difficult to find stones that match so perfectly at this size. Set in eighteen karat gold. And you see how the clasp is made up of rubies and sapphires? The very best of everything.”

The best of everything. What would that be like, I wondered. To have the best of everything?

There was a time when I thought I’d had it all. A husband I loved who adored me. Two beautiful, healthy little girls. A life as shiny as the diamonds twinkling on my wrist. This would have been our thirty-second Christmas together. I smiled softly—and a little sadly. By now, Charlie would have been able to afford to buy me something from Ivan for Christmas. Something I’d wear when we went out on New Year’s Eve.

I held my arm out. The bracelet draped just right. But my nails—what a mess. It would be a travesty for a woman like me to own a bracelet like this. There was a time I’d taken better care of my hands—when Charlie had been here to hold them.

I took off the bracelet and handed it back to Ivan. “I’m sure your customer’s wife will be very happy with it.”

When I left the jewelry store I kept thinking about the shape my cuticles were in. How shameful they’d looked next to that bracelet. Iris’s House of Beauty was across the street. It had been years since I’d had a manicure.

“Hey, kid,” Iris said. “Did you come in here to sell raffle tickets or something?”

I laughed. “No—I actually thought about treating myself to a manicure.”

Her eyes widened. “What’s the occasion?”

“I was feeling nostalgic.”

Iris looked puzzled. “Nostalgic for a manicure?”

“Something like that. Can you fit me in?”

“You better believe it. I’ve been trying to get my hands on your cuticles for years. Why don’t you let me highlight your hair today, too? And maybe shape your brows.”

“Don’t push it. Just be happy I’m getting a manicure.”

“Honey, I’d jump for joy if these boots weren’t killing my feet.”

The place was buzzing with gossip, as usual. Iris had three stylists and a manicurist working for her and they relished regaling the customers with details about their various love lives, diets and favorite soap operas. If anyone had gained weight in town, was on the verge of bankruptcy or divorce, this was the place you heard about it first.

It was, “Girl, did you see those hips in those boot-cut leggings?” or “They say the balance on her MasterCard has more digits than her phone number.” I’d always felt a tiny bit uncomfortable with it all. Probably another reason I tended to avoid the place. Plus, I wasn’t fond of having so many mirror images of myself to look at and be judged. I didn’t need any reminders that my chin was getting slacker and my laugh lines were turning into crow’s feet.

Sally, the manicurist, had graduated a year ahead of me so we knew each other only slightly. Still, I got every detail about her brilliant grandchildren.

“I told my son, you’d better start saving your money. The oldest is going to wind up in one of those expensive Ivy League schools out east—you mark my words.”

I assured her I would.

She leaned closer. “Say, is it true what they say about Mary Stillman?”

I had no idea who Mary Stillman was, but Sally gave me the complete picture on what was being said about her, anyway.

An hour and a few dozen confidential tidbits later, I walked out with a set of fake nail tips elongating my fingers. I’d given in to Sally’s choice of polish—a purplish red that looked even more garish out in the cold afternoon. And now I was really running late. I had two more clients to drop in on and I still wanted to start my Christmas shopping.

As did everyone else in the county, apparently. When I finally got there, the discount store was packed. I lost a fingernail nabbing the last of the most popular video game of the year off the shelf for Matt and I’d hovered near a woman who was deciding over a sweater that I knew would be perfect for Natalie. When she put it back down and looked away, I swooped in like a hawk on a field mouse. Before I got into line at the checkout counter, on impulse I turned down the music aisle and started to search. There it was—our prom theme—on a compilation disk of seventies soft rock. I dropped it into my cart.

The checkout lines were long. By the time I made it back to the car, I was exhausted, but I wrestled with the frustrating CD packaging anyway, losing another nail tip in the process. I wanted to hear that song again. Now.

I sat in the parking lot, puffs of my warm breath visible in the cold car, and listened to the song. Twice. I felt like I wanted to cry. Was it for the loss of the girl who’d danced with such hope in her heart? Was it for the woman who I was supposed to have become who’d never quite materialized?

God, this was insane, I thought. Sitting in a cold car—a rusty station wagon no less—listening to love songs from my high school years.

I popped the CD out of the player. It immediately switched to a radio station playing all Christmas music. I bit the bottom of my lip and shook my head. “Abby,” I whispered into the icy air, “you picked a great time to have a midlife crisis.”

I drove home, hauled the packages into the house, stowed them in the front hall closet and went into the living room.

“Well, it’s about time,” Gwen said from the sofa. “I’m starving.”

Natalie looked up from her magazine. “I’m starving, too. And, Ma, the kids keep asking me when you’re going to decorate for Christmas.”

“Yeah, don’t you usually have a tree by now, Mother? By the way,” Gwen added, a secret little smile on her face, “David called seven times today. I think your answering machine is almost full.”

The kids suddenly ran down the stairs, squealing, and Nat shushed them. “Daddy’s napping.”

You know that saying I saw red? Well, it’s true. I saw red. And we’re not talking festive lights here. I think it was the red of my blood boiling up to my eyeballs.

“What does Daddy have to nap for?” I asked testily. “He’s not working. And he’s certainly not doing anything around here.”

Natalie got up and quickly glanced at the stairs. “Ma—shh, he’ll hear you.”

“Nat, I think Jeremy already knows he’s not working. And he sure as hell knows he’s not doing anything around here.”

She cocked her hip. “What the hell has gotten into you?”

“That’s another thing. Will you please watch your mouth? You gripe if anyone else uses bad language in front of the kids but you’re the worst of all.”

Gwen, wearing yet another expensive nightgown and robe ensemble, snickered from the sofa.

I swung around to face her. “And you. You’re a grown woman. Isn’t it time you got dressed and started doing something around here, too? Like maybe, for instance, making dinner?”

From the look on her face you’d think I’d asked her to sign up for boot camp.

Nat gave a short laugh. “Princess Gwen doesn’t cook, Ma. She orders.”

“Then what about you? You can’t make a damn box of macaroni and cheese for your kids?”

As if they’d been cued from offstage, the kids came running through the living room again.

“Grandma! When can we get a Christmas tree?”

“Do you know where my skates are?”

“Can I have a sleepover this weekend?”

“Aren’t you going to put stuff up outside this year, Grandma?”

“You know what,” I said as I eyed the other adults in the room, “I think you’d better start asking your parents those questions—or Auntie Gwen—because as of right now, Grandma is on strike.”

“What?” Both Nat and Gwen asked in unison.

“I am going on strike,” I enunciated clearly. It wasn’t something I’d planned to say. But while my blood boiled, the story Mike had told us on Friday at the diner bubbled up with it. If a man could go on strike against his wife for lack of affection, why couldn’t a woman go on strike against her family for lack of cooperation? “As of this moment, all of you are on your own. For meals. For laundry. For Christmas.”

There was a collective gasp.

“That’s right,” I reiterated. “No tree. No decorations. No cookies. I. Am. On. Strike.”

I crossed the hall, passed through the dining room, went through to the kitchen, grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerator, poured cereal into a bowl, added milk, grabbed a spoon and took it into the maid’s room where I sat in my mother’s old rocking chair and dined on Special K and silence.

Except the cereal lasted longer than the silence. Soon the kitchen just outside my door erupted into the noise of six hungry people who weren’t even sure where the butter was kept. I listened to them as I crunched, willing myself not to go to their rescue. One question kept running over and over again in my brain. When a woman finally decides that her time has come, where the hell is she supposed to spend it?