My interview went fantastically well. It helped that I went into it believing that I would be hired, and it also helped that everyone I met that morning seemed to think so as well. Christophe Montmartre, who’d arranged everything, managed to get just about every current faculty member from art history to show up. It wasn’t a large department, and most of them had planned to come in to catch up on paperwork, so no one seemed to resent having to be there during a holiday week. The new chair of art history, Heidi Maslov, was so excited to have me as a candidate, she was actually trying to woo and flatter me. I might have told her that she needn’t have bothered—I wanted the job so desperately I found it hard not to fawn all over everyone.
I was shown my potential office, given a quick tour, and then we all had a formal, sit-down conversation about my credentials and the job’s responsibilities. Everyone was impressed with me, and I with them and the job. Christophe dropped by briefly to say hello at the end, and when we started chattering away in French like old friends, I was pretty sure I’d just nailed it. I walked back to my car certain they would call me to arrange the next step.
I’d texted Amelia just before going into the interview to let her know I was turning my phone off. This was a code between us that generally meant I was painting. This arrangement had been a hard-won battle, as Amelia thought it should always be possible to contact me. I didn’t think there was a single emergency that warranted being in constant contact. We went back and forth about it so often I’d simply had to put my foot down—I could turn my damn phone off when I felt like it.
When I turned my phone on in the car, I found only a single response from her—a texted picture of some white roses from her garden last summer. The image brought tears to my eyes, as it spoke of all the progress we’d made since we started dating. The photo meant, simply, that she loved me and thought I was beautiful. As I drove back to my place, I tried to call her, but, as my interview had lasted into the early afternoon, I’d missed her mini lunch break.
Back at home, I took off my beautiful gray skirt suit, grinning at the memory of the interview I’d had last September. I’d shown up for my appointment with the notorious Amelia Winters wearing some of my Aunt Kate’s old work clothes. They’d looked terrible and were ill-fitting, but as I didn’t own anything suited for business, they’d been better than nothing. Now I had a whole wardrobe of fine clothes, many of them tailored, all thanks to Amelia. This thought gave me pause again. Amelia had bought all of these clothes for me, ostensibly so I could look the part as her assistant at work. She’d spent lavishly on them, and looking at them now, I realized once again the significant investment she’d made in me. If I left her employment, all of this would go to waste.
I shook my head, angry with my self-doubt. Yes, she’d bought me these clothes, and yes, they were for work, but I’d already made her company hundreds of thousands of dollars. As far as I was concerned, I’d earned them already. And anyway, when I’d brought up paying her back for the clothes out of my wages, she’d dismissed the idea, laughing. As far as she was concerned, the clothes were a gift.
Calmer now and more at ease with my decision to work for the university if they wanted me, I went back to my painting, becoming lost in it. By the time I snapped out of my dream world, I was running late for dinner and had to drive to my aunt’s place to make it on time.
When I got there, at exactly four, I walked inside without knocking. I’d grown up here, for the most part, and Kate and I didn’t stand on ceremony. The house was incredibly warm, and the scent of peppers and onions made my eyes sting the moment I walked in. Kate came bustling out of the kitchen in her usual cooking disarray, her graying hair wild and her apron splattered with sauces and flour. Neither of us paid attention to this kind of thing and hugged anyway, the tomato sauce on her hands smearing into my shirt.
“Oh my goodness! You’re a sight for sore eyes,” she said. “You look so healthy and tan!”
“All we did was eat seafood and drink piña coladas and margaritas.” Among other things, I thought.
“Well, you needed it. You work much too hard, sweetie. You’re going to burn out if you’re not careful.”
I let her little jibe slide, used to it at this point. She took every opportunity to criticize my work with Amelia, and Amelia’s business in general. Despite my excellent salary, she thought it beneath me.
I didn’t want to get into it, so I changed the subject. “Where are the others?”
“Meghan just popped out for some wine, and Zach and Jim aren’t coming. Zach has to work, and Jim was just called out of state on some granite-countertop emergency or something with his company. It’s just going to be us ladies tonight.” Her eyebrows shot up. “Oh! Where’s Amelia?”
“She couldn’t come,” I said, trying to sound casual. I hated the cracks about Amelia’s company, but I especially hated it when Kate criticized Amelia for missing things like this. It wasn’t as if she did it on purpose.
Luckily Aunt Kate seemed to know when to let it go, as all she did was shake her head. “Well, that’s too bad. Maybe she’ll make it next time. And anyway, it does seem like an age since it was just the three of us.”
It did. Meghan and I became friends right before I moved in with Aunt Kate. We were both in middle school, and my parents had just died in a car accident. Meghan’s dad had abandoned them when she was a kid, and her mom, a musician, was frequently MIA, so Meghan stayed at our place at least a couple of nights a week through high school. To some extent, she’d been like a second surrogate daughter to Kate, and lately it was rare that the three of us had a night together without someone’s boyfriend or, more recently, girlfriend in the mix. Tonight was a good opportunity to catch up as a family again.
Meghan came in a moment later, and she and I greeted each other with a long, solid hug. I realized then that it had been almost six weeks since I’d seen her—a length of time that would previously have been unheard of. In high school and college, she and I had basically been attached at the hip, either seeing or calling each other every day. We’d gone to different colleges, but that didn’t stop us from hanging out every weekend into our early twenties. When I’d moved to France for my graduate studies, we still had weekly phone calls and long visits during my holiday breaks. Things had changed lately with the introduction of Amelia into my life, and that change was rarely clearer than when I realized how distant Meghan and I had become. She’d cut her hair recently, and her clothes looked a little smarter than usual. It seemed like she was a different woman almost every time I saw her.
“You look great, Chloé. You really do. I haven’t seen you this tan since the Jazz Fest disaster of 2010.”
I laughed. We’d both been twenty-one, and both of us had gotten ridiculously drunk at Jazz Fest. We’d been too far gone to think about the fact that we were outside in the sun all day, and both of us had been sunburnt to hell, wincing and pussyfooting around in pain for days after.
“God, don’t remind me,” I said. “I still can’t listen to Elvis Costello without wanting to smear aloe all over my body.” We both laughed.
“What kind of wine did you get?” Aunt Kate asked, interrupting us.
“All of them,” Meghan replied, holding up her bag. It held at least four bottles. “I thought we could take this opportunity to celebrate, just the three of us, since I know you both have some good news.”
This was the first time I’d heard about Kate’s news, but when I looked at her, she was glaring at Meghan as if to silence her.
“You’re right, Meghan,” she said, “but we have to eat something, too, and the food is almost ready. You should always have a wine cushion.”
We followed Kate into the kitchen, and Meghan and I immediately started setting the table—our old chore as adolescents and young adults. I brought out wineglasses, and Meghan poured very liberal glasses of pinot grigio for all of us.
“I thought you had to work tonight,” I said.
She shrugged. “I do, but I can always head in a little late—my coworker won’t mind. It’s the Friday after Mardi Gras. People are worn out. It’s always a dead zone in there this weekend.”
When Kate served the shrimp-and-crawfish étouffée, I began salivating before I even tasted it. Kate knew this was my favorite dish and served it only on special occasions. The rice was fluffy and spiced, the bread fresh and hot, and she’d whipped up her own homemade butter. It was, as usual, enough food for twice as many people, but the three of us did a fair job of decimating the spread. After we finished, the table looked something like a natural disaster. We kept the dinner conversation light, by house rules. Important or bad news had to wait until after the meal to avoid detracting from the food. Food in a Creole home should, according to Aunt Kate, be the center of attention at a meal.
We left the mess and headed into the living room with our second bottle of wine—this time a sparkling rosé. Meghan brought out champagne flutes, and she and I sat close to each other on the love seat. Aunt Kate sat in the nearby armchair, all of us close enough to brush legs.
“Okay,” Kate said. “I want to hear about the interview. I can hardly stand the suspense.”
I looked at the two of them with a serious expression, letting the tension build, and then broke into a wide smile. “It went great. More than great. I think I’ll get the job.”
Meghan and Aunt Kate were tremendously happy for me, both of them rocketing out of their seats and pulling me into a three-way hug. We danced around a little, and when we sat back down I told them all about the school and the department.
“I told you that you’d like it there,” Meghan said. “I think I even took an art-history course when I went there. Well, maybe—I never went to class. But I signed up for it, anyway.”
“Did they tell you what kind of classes you’d be teaching?” Kate asked.
“Mostly freshman- and sophomore-level courses for now. Introduction one and two, that kind of thing. But I’ll get more advanced courses in time, once they can work me into the rotation.”
Meghan squeezed my shoulders. “I’m so damn happy for you, Chloé. You’ve worked so hard for this—harder than anyone I know.”
Aunt Kate touched my knee. “Me too, honey. I can’t wait to tell everyone that my niece is a professor.”
I held up my hands. “Let’s not get too hasty. I haven’t been offered the job yet.”
“But you will,” Kate said, nodding with certainty. “I know it.”
Her confidence brought tears to my eyes, and soon all us were blinking and wiping our eyes. I had worked very hard at my various degrees and internships, and these women had been with me through all of it. They knew as well as I did that I wouldn’t have made it without them. Their encouragement and devotion had made it possible for me to get where I was today.
I cleared my throat. “Okay. Enough tears. This is a happy occasion, and Meghan said you have some news, too, Aunt Kate. What is it?”
Meghan and Kate shared a worried glance, and my heart rate picked up. What were they hiding from me?
I must have looked apprehensive, as Kate laughed and patted my hand reassuringly. “Don’t be worried, Chloé. It’s good news. I’m just sorry I didn’t tell you first. It happened when you were in Mexico.”
“I just happened to drop by the next day, and she told me everything,” Meghan explained.
“Just know I would have told you right away if you were here,” Kate said.
“What? What would you have told me?”
Kate took a deep breath and let it out. “Jim and I are getting married.”
The news was so surprising, I didn’t know how to react. Before my parents died, my aunt had been married to a drunk who’d deserted her. They’d had a nasty divorce some years after he left. She’d spent most of my adolescence and early twenties telling me to avoid marriage at all costs. While I knew she and Jim had become serious—he’d recently moved into her place part-time—I’d never expected them to get married.
“Wow!” I finally said. “I never—”
“Right? Who would have thought? I know I told you for years how stupid marriage is. But I’ll admit it—I was wrong. When he asked me last Saturday, I didn’t even hesitate. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world.” She paused. “I hope you’ll be my maid of honor, Chloé.”
“Of course, Aunt Kate! I’m honored! I’m so happy for you!”
We all stood up and hugged again, and Meghan told me that she was going to be the bridesmaid. The wedding was already scheduled for the first Saturday in April—just over six weeks from now. I found this timeframe shocking, but Aunt Kate reassured me. “We don’t want it to be a big thing. We’ve both been married before, and a big wedding seems silly at our age. It’s just going to be some close family and friends. We’re doing the court thing on that Friday with just us, you girls, and his sons. Then on Saturday, we’ll have the reception with everyone else downtown. Very casual—forty or fifty people tops.”
I was crying now, openly, though my tears were entirely happy ones. When I’d moved in with my aunt, she was fairly young to be a legal guardian for a fourteen-year-old. She was much younger than her sister, my mother, and I think her guardianship of me had effectively ended what remained of her youth. She’d never resented me. She’d fought like crazy with the other aunts and uncles on my dad’s side to get custody and eventually won. She needn’t have done that. Our family is huge, especially on my father’s side, and right after my parents died, I’d spent almost a year being shuttled between different aunts, uncles, and cousins as the legal battle raged. Many of them would have been happy to keep me, but my mom’s little sister had insisted the hardest and the longest and won out in the end. Even as a young and selfish adolescent, I’d felt sorry for her, having to take me in like lost luggage, but she’d never shown a moment’s hesitation. Despite their age difference, she and my mother had been very close, and as my mom’s only sibling, she seemed to think it was her duty.
She’d dated, on and off, over the years, but she always seemed to back out right when things started to get serious, especially when I was younger. I’d also known her to break up with men when they’d seemed reluctant to accept me as part of her life. I’d felt incredibly bad about that for years. She was always quick to reassure me it wasn’t about me at all, but I’d never quite believed her. Dating Jim, moving in with him, and now marrying him finally put that past to rest. She would have her own life now.
Kate told me a little bit more about the wedding. Jim’s three sons would be joining us a week early, and she asked if I could put one of them up at my place, which was fine. Jim’s brother would also attend, but Jim wasn’t close with anyone else in his family, so his side of the guest list would be limited to his sons, his brother, and their various wives and girlfriends. While Aunt Kate didn’t have any other siblings, she had a mountain of cousins, aunts, and uncles, and it would be hard to limit the attendees.
She paused, looking troubled. “There’s one more thing, Chloé.”
“What?”
“As you know, Jim’s construction business is doing really well. He’s been splitting his time between here and Florida since Katrina, but he’s getting a little tired of going back and forth all the time. The work here is starting to dry up a little, which means he sometimes misses out on opportunities in Florida because he spends so much time here or in the car.”
I knew where she was going with this, and my face must have reflected my dread. She smiled weakly and took my hand in hers. “Chloé, we’re moving to Florida.”
I couldn’t help my response. “Oh no! You can’t, Aunt Kate! You love it here! Your whole family is here!”
She nodded, her face still serious. “You’re right on all accounts, honey. But we’ve talked long and hard about this. He’s years from retirement, and it just doesn’t make sense for him to move here right now. I’m still a relatively young woman, and I’ve been thinking of going back to teaching full-time. They’re desperate for teachers in Florida right now.”
I was crushed. While I was happy for Aunt Kate and recognized the sense in what she was saying, it was difficult to think of living here in the city without her. She and I were very close. Still, I knew I needed to put on a brave face. She’d given up some of the best years of her life to take care of me and was finally moving on. We stood up and hugged again, and I had to fight back my tears for a few minutes. The wine wasn’t helping. In fact, it was starting to make me feel a little maudlin, but I let Meghan fill our glasses for a celebratory toast.
We talked of less-important matters for a while. I gave them their presents from Mexico, Meghan showed us some pictures from her concert tour, and Kate served pecan tarts with peach ice cream. Finally, after Meghan and I drank a couple of cups of strong coffee to sober up, we gathered our coats to leave. Meghan left before me, seeming to understand that I needed a moment alone with my aunt.
Once she was gone, Kate put her hand on my shoulder and made eye contact with me. “The move won’t be immediate, Chloé. We’re planning to live there half-time at first, every other month for a while, just to make sure it works. He has some projects here that won’t end for another year, and I want to sub down there for a while before getting something more permanent. I’ll still be around for a long while before I move for good.”
“I’m sorry, Aunt Kate. I know I should be happy for you. It’s just hard. You’ve always been here for me. But I don’t want to be selfish, either.”
“You aren’t. And don’t worry—I’ll always be here for you. I just won’t be here, here. But you can call me any time, and we’ll visit each other all the time. Florida is just beautiful.”
I nodded, holding back tears again.
“You’ll see,” she said, hugging my shoulders. “You’ll be so busy with your new job you won’t even notice I’m gone.”
I brushed away a stray tear or two and laughed. “Says you. I know I’ll be freaked out, and you won’t be here to make me ice cream or tell me it’ll all be better later.”
“It will. And you’ll be a great professor. I promise.”
I grinned at her. “See! That’s what I need. Someone with confidence in me.”
She looked a little troubled, and I saw her weighing something in her mind. Finally, she made eye contact with me. “What about Amelia? Doesn’t she support you?”
“Of course she does,” I said, impatient and defensive about her, as always.
Her brow cleared a little. “Well, good. What does she think about this job opportunity, by the way? I forgot to ask earlier.”
This time I paused, and my hesitance must have been clear as I could see Kate tense up. “Is she upset?”
“No.” I paused, hesitating. “I haven’t told her yet.”
Kate was a quiet for a long time, her gaze sad and concerned. I could see that she wanted to say something, likely something very hurtful, but she kept her mouth closed, waiting for me to finish.
“She was working all night last night and all day today. I haven’t had a chance.” My excuse sounded even stupider spoken aloud, and my temper heated up at Kate’s continued silence—it seemed to mock and accuse me.
“I’m sure she’ll be happy for me, Kate. She’s not some kind of monster.”
Aunt Kate just shook her head and gave me a quick hug. “Well, you better tell her soon. Are you seeing her tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Then tell her right away. Don’t wait.”
My temper flared again, and it was all I could do not to yell an angry retort. I excused myself as graciously as I could and stormed back to my place on foot, too angry and still a little too drunk to get behind the wheel of my car.
Aunt Kate’s expression haunted me all the way home. I kept telling myself I was being silly, that of course Amelia would be happy for me, but it was getting harder and harder to ignore the growing kernel of doubt and guilt when I pictured telling her. Further, I couldn’t quite explain to myself why I hadn’t confided in her immediately. I could have tried harder yesterday and today, and I hadn’t. Did that mean I was afraid of what she might say or do? Aunt Kate seemed to think so, without actually saying as much. I could tell that’s what she thought. Was I worried about Amelia, too? I was certainly acting that way.
I walked quickly, angrily back to my place, and by the time I reached my apartment, I was ready to do anything to get rid of my growing fear and guilt. Amelia picked up the second I rang.
“My God, it’s good to hear from you,” she said. I could hear the fatigue in her voice. “I’m just wrapping up at work now. Can I come over?”
“Yes. Please. I have something really important to tell you.”
“You sound so serious about it, honey. I hope it’s good news.”
“It is. At least, I think it is. Anyway, get here as fast as you can.”
“I’m on my way.”