Mama never spoke of it outright, but surely she glimpsed, smelled, and tasted some piece of death, had a growing sense of what the whole of it would bring. Its proximity had begun to encroach on her living space and change her body, shrink it, steal its definition, overshadow it with a hazy pall. When she looked in the mirror, she must have wondered whose face she was seeing and where these changes were taking her.
Camille wondered and wanted desperately to ask her mother what was going on, to simply ask what was on her mind the way she once did as a child, before she’d learned about the rudeness of looking, pointing, asking too many questions, making people feel bad.
Why do your eyes look funny, Mama?
Does that sore on your lip hurt?
Who better to ask than Mama? Who knew more? Maybe Father knew best back then, but Mama knew more, and she would tell Camille what she needed to know. Changes were fascinating and powerful and scary, and who else could explain them?
When am I going to have boobies like yours mama?
Jeez, Mama, is this all I get? Aren’t these tits ever going to get any bigger?
How low are these boobs going to sag?
Why am I bleeding?
When will I stop getting my period, Mama? When did you?
Who will I ask when you’re not here anymore?
Why can’t I ask you now?
She couldn’t ask because she was a coward, because she saw changes in her mother’s body that smacked of finality, even as they seemed strangely like a return to a time before Camille. Was this what it meant to come full circle? Without her wig, without her hair, Mama looked babyish. Her pale face seemed softer, more serene, and Camille wondered what feelings went along with these changes.
But Rosemary offered no invitation to ask, no inclination to talk. Instead, she brought out items from her jewelry box. She unearthed old things that Camille remembered seeing in the breakfront cabinet that no longer stood in the living room, or in the dining room hutch that contained Camille’s collection of pottery instead of Rosemary’s china. She dug up memories and deposited them in her daughter’s account.
“You know where this came from, don’t you?” Rosemary quizzed, emerging from her room carrying a large glass pedestal bowl as though she were taking up an offering. She set it on the kitchen counter next to the chicken Camille was preparing to make into comfort food.
Camille had a vague memory of the lacy blue glass, but she wasn’t certain when or where she’d seen it before. “Was it a wedding present?”
“From Aunt Caroline. Your great-aunt.” With a badly chewed fingertip, Rosemary traced the molded glass filigree, which eddied across the slope of the bowl. “My mother’s oldest sister. She was always so good to me, sent me birthday cards that she made herself. I should have saved those.” She looked up, caught her daughter’s eye as she slid the dish a scant inch closer to the chopped chicken. “Matt isn’t going to want any of this stuff, you know.”
“Have you asked him?”
“I can’t bring anything like that up with him. You know how he is.”
“Have you asked him to come home for Christmas this year?”
“Let’s see how things go,” Rosemary said quietly as she slipped her hand into the pocket of the tan slacks that lately fit her like a gathered skirt. “Look what else I found,” she said, her fingers springing open, childlike, her tone suddenly as bright as the sparkling brooch she revealed. “I thought I was the cat’s meow when I wore this to a party.”
“The cat’s meow,” Camille echoed, smiling. “That’s beautiful, Mama, but the cat’s meow? That’s a new one. You hate cats.”
“I’m allergic to cats, but the meow doesn’t bother me. And it’s hardly a new expression. Don’t you remember your grandma saying you looked like the cat’s meow? Well, this was hers.” The pavé-set stones sparkled as Rosemary angled her hand to catch the light.
“It’s beautiful,” Camille repeated.
“Would you ever wear it? This Art Deco period is quite collectible now, you know. You should see what they get for things like this on eBay.”
Camille ran water over her hands to make them fit to touch. She had no idea whether the stylized floral design was made of gems or glass. It didn’t matter. She’d never worn much jewelry herself, but she remembered getting caught using this brooch to fashion a scarf dress on one of her dolls. She also remembered the rare spanking she’d gotten for getting into Mama’s jewelry box.
“You’ll wear it at Christmas,” Camille said as she wiped her hands on a dish towel.
“I’m serious. We should have some of these old things appraised so you can insure them. I’m telling you—”
“Mama.” Camille sandwiched the brooch and her mother’s hand between both of hers. “I don’t need an appraisal. I promise you, I’m not going to hold an estate sale. Grandma’s brooch and that whatever-it-is from Great-Aunt Caroline—”
“It’s a compote.”
“They’re not going anywhere, Mama.”
“They should go to Jordan someday.”
“They’ll have to pass through me first. I want to see what it feels like to be a meow.”
“You know that royal blue suit with the fitted jacket?” Rosemary pressed the brooch into Camille’s hands. “This will be perfect with that suit.”
“I’ll borrow it next time I wear the suit. If I can still get into it.” Neither of them looked at it as the brooch changed hands again. “This belongs in your jewelry box, but this…” Camille carefully lifted the glass bowl. Its weight surprised her. “This goes in the hutch. I didn’t realize we had a compote.”
“Your father didn’t like it. He said it looked like a piece of tacky old junk. To him, old was synonymous with poor. He wanted the latest in everything.”
“Creed did, too. But we don’t have to decorate around them now, do we?” Camille took the heirloom into the dining room, which itself could well become an heirloom room since it was rarely used these days. She turned on the overhead light—a chandelier that made the design in blue glass sparkle almost like pavé gems. “I’m going to rearrange the hutch so that this will really take center—”
The front door—also rarely used—opened with a squeak, followed by an exuberant “I’m home! Is anyone else here?”
Camille set the compote on the table and straightened her T-shirt, checking the front for food spills. She was a messy cook, and Jordan never used the front door or announced herself like a chirpy songbird unless she had someone with her.
“Just the cat and her meow,” Camille called out.
The joke sailed right over the bright and beautiful head that peeked around the doorframe. “Mother, I have a surprise. Where’s Grandma?”
Camille gestured toward the kitchen. “She’s—”
“Grandma, could you come in here, please?” Jordan called toward the kitchen, but her eager gesture was directed toward the front door. “We…James and I…”
He joined her, taking her outstretched hand, looking for all the world like somebody who’d just smoked his first joint.
Camille’s gut trembled around an ominous feeling. She was about to lose her chick to a wolf wearing a boy-next-door mask. Was there still time to drag him by the ear and throw him out before he got her daughter hooked on his brand of high?
Not according to the silly shine in Jordan’s dark eyes.
“We have something to tell you.”
Rosemary appeared silently from the kitchen.
Camille knew what was coming, and she hung on to the moment before it came for as long as Jordan would allow her to.
“We’re”—she thrust her left hand out and shifted her finger, catching the light in her new ring—“getting married.”
“Oh, my…” Camille felt winded, breathless, blinded by the light. It was a day for all kinds of sparkle. “Engaged? Jordan…”
Drawn to the ring, drawn to her child, she finally drew breath and sailed into a hug.
“Engaged?” She gasped again as she took the girl’s ring hand in hers and peered at it. Not that she doubted the value or the weight. She’d heard the voice and seen the faces and felt the news in her gut. Therein lay the value and the weight. And the deposit on guaranteed change.
“Yes, engaged. We’re getting married. And soon, that much we agree on.” Jordan squeezed her mother’s hand before she drew it away and laid it on her fiancé’s arm. “The engagement ring was James’s idea. The wedding is mine.”
“The wedding?”
“I’d be happy with a JP,” James said, “but Jordan has convinced me that we should do it up right.”
God, his voice sounded deep and husky.
“Every woman dreams of a beautiful wedding,” he added over Camille’s thoughts of where had all the children gone.
Gone to brides and grooms, every one.
“Not every woman,” Camille said, taking exception even as she opened her arms to her future son-in-law and whispered her congratulations.
Then back to her daughter. “Oh, honey, I’m so…” Another squeeze finally got the words flowing. “But this is so sudden. I always thought you’d tell me you were in love first. You know, like, ‘Mom, I’m in love with James, and I think he loves me.’ And then you’d start hinting about marriage, and I’d have time to get used to the idea before you’d start flashing a ring. And then you’d be engaged for a nice long while, and then—”
“Oh, Mother.” Jordan gave a quick laugh. “I’ve already told you I was in love with James.”
“When you were twelve.”
“And right then I said I was going to marry him.”
“Yes, but he wasn’t in on the plan.” Camille grabbed his arm. “I want to hear it from James.”
“I’m crazy in love with your daughter, so I plan to make her my wife and you my mother-in-law.” He kissed Camille’s cheek.
A little too smoothly, she thought. Shouldn’t he have been shaking in his boots right about now?
“And Grandma here…” James extricated himself from mother and daughter and headed for Rosemary.
Camille watched him take those steps, not in boots but in running shoes. For some crazy reason she breathed more easily.
“You’re as much part of my plan as anybody,” James told Rosemary as he leaned down to peck her cheek. “Have you met my Grandma Mayfield?”
“Briefly, at Lauren’s wedding.” She put her arms around James’s neck and gave a happy groan. “Such good news.”
“Every family needs a grandma. That’s why I’m inviting you,” James recited, tucking her under his arm. “Grandma Mayfield is a bust as a grandma.”
“She can’t be. There are no rules for grandmas. Grandma is as Grandma does.” Rosemary stepped away from James, a new sparkle in her eyes, a tint of color in her cheeks. “And this grandma has a wedding dress to make.”
“Oh, Grandma, you don’t have to worry about—”
“No worries,” Rosemary said as she hugged her granddaughter. “It’ll be beautiful. Any style you want, but you need to decide and give me a head start. I’m a little slower than I used to be.”
“You know what I think about spending a lot of—”
“Money on a wedding, I know, Mama,” Jordan said.
Camille wanted to bite her own bitter tongue off.
“I don’t want to go overboard, but I do want a wedding,” Jordan went on. “Small, simple, elegant.”
“How do you feel about it?” Camille asked James.
“I know my mother went bonkers with Lauren’s shindig, but it was a nice time. Innocent, kind of.” He gave a boyish shrug. “Like I said, I’d be happy with a JP, but whatever Jordan wants is fine with me.”
“Have you broken the news to…anyone else?”
“You’re the first,” Jordan said.
With a knowing look, James acknowledged Camille’s concern for his mother. “Thought we’d practice on you.”
“We knew you’d be happy for us, Mom.”
“I’ve known you both all your lives, but you can still surprise me.” Shouldn’t be able to, Camille thought. A good mother would have seen it coming. But she smiled in the knowledge that James would be a good husband. “It’s the good kind of a surprise.”
“Aren’t Bridget and Ellie coming over here tomorrow for lunch?” Rosemary asked. Camille had suggested that they include her mother this time.
“We’ll tell Mom tonight.”
“Ask Ellie if she’ll sing for our wedding.”
Bridget arrived for lunch on Ellie’s heels. Camille barely had time to break the news to Ellie, who gave a cheer and a hug, then glanced out the door. Bridget was coming up the flagstone walk.
“Is she okay with it?”
“We’ll soon find out,” Camille whispered.
Bridget’s greeting was soft and cool. She asked first about Camille’s mother—a polite but pointed way of avoiding mention of her daughter. Okay, Camille thought. I won’t ask until you tell.
“She insisted on making her curried chicken salad for us, which is a good sign. She hasn’t felt much like being around food for—”
“The answer is yes, I’ve heard the news,” Bridget said.
Camille exchanged a quick glance with Ellie. And she’s not too happy about it.
“They said they wanted to practice up on me first,” Camille said, keeping it light. “Probably because there’s only one of me. Grandma’s blessing is always a given.”
“Were you as surprised as I was?”
“I don’t know, Bridge.” Camille slipped an arm around her friend. “Probably more surprised than I should have been.”
“I was stunned,” Bridget said emotionlessly, stepping away, moving inside. “I still am.”
“We set the table in the dining room,” Camille called after Bridget, wondering where she thought she was going. She glanced at Ellie again, looking for support. She found it in Ellie’s eyes.
“Are we expecting anyone else?” Bridget wanted to know, headed for the table as though she were reporting for a business meeting. “I was hoping for just us.”
“Just us.” Camille grabbed an envelope off the buffet. Ellie and Bridget took seats at the table she and Rosemary had set earlier with cloth napkins, matching placemats, and grocery-store daffodils in a blue glass vase. “How do you like Great-Aunt Caroline’s compote?” she said of the heirloom she’d filled with fruit salad.
Praise for the piece was nominal.
Pulling a handful of snapshots from the envelope, Camille took another tack.
“Isn’t this weird?” She handed Ellie a couple of the pictures and gave Bridget a few more, all of them showing Bridget and Camille wearing long hair and long peasant dresses, all in colors of the past. They were celebrating the first of their babies. “I was going through picture boxes last night, and I found these. Look at this one.” She passed her new favorite of the pictures over Bridget’s shoulder. “Before I’d even met Creed, before there was any thought of Jordan, here I am holding James.”
“I had to keep reminding you to support his head,” Bridget mumbled.
“I’d almost forgotten that I was his godmother.” Camille laughed, revisiting the awkwardness she’d felt when the picture was taken. “Some friend, huh? I hope I make a better mother-in-law.”
Bridget turned her head slowly, punctuating the move with an odd stare.
“I know,” Camille assured her. “I wasn’t ready either.”
The nearly imperceptible shake of her head, more like a shudder, and the befuddled look in her eyes seemed, even under present circumstances, very un-Bridget. Especially under the circumstances.
“What? What’s wrong?”
Bridget turned away, back to the photograph.
Camille slid into the chair at the end of the table, peering, waiting for an answer that wasn’t coming fast enough.
“What did you say when you heard the news, Bridge? Did you…You didn’t argue or anything, did you?”
“With James and Jordan?” Bridget shook her head. “They didn’t stay long.”
“Are you all right?”
“Not really.” There was that dazed look again, as though she’d been slapped by a friend. “She’s pregnant, isn’t she?”
It was Camille’s turn to feel the sting. Slowly, carefully she explained, “Bridget, they’re engaged.”
“Because she’s pregnant.”
“Because they plan to get married. No, she’s not pregnant.”
“She told you that?”
The sting was turning to heat. Not a sound came from the kitchen, nor from Ellie’s end of the table. This was between mothers, and Camille was hard-pressed to keep her cool.
Ellie’s chair scraped the floor. “I’m going to check on Rosemary and the salad.”
When Ellie was gone from the room, Camille answered softly, but there was no mistaking the warning in her tone. “You know what, Bridget? The subject of pregnancy simply didn’t come up.”
“Why am I not surprised?” Eyes wide with sudden awakening, Bridget squared herself. “You never ask the right questions, Camille, which is why you never have all the facts. Why else would they be talking about getting married?”
“Bridget, calm down before you say something really ugly.”
“Ugly?” Bridget touched fingertips to forehead, as though she were trying to reason or remember. “In this day and age,” she whispered. “And James, at his age, my God.”
“What are you talking about, age? What is this, Bridget? Your son is marrying my daughter, and they’re both of age. And she’s not pregnant.”
“Do you know that for sure?”
“I don’t know for sure that she’d tell me if she were, but I think she would. It’s not the first thing that came to my mind when I heard the news.”
“You approve?”
“Approve? In this day and age?”
“You still want Jordan to go back and finish school. You’ve said that many times. And James…I can’t believe James would…” Bridget kept shaking her head, as though the turn of events in her son’s life were an insect that could be shaken away. “I thought he was smarter. I thought…”
“Smarter than…” Not Jordan. Don’t you dare say Jordan.
The head shaking continued.
“James is a brilliant man who has so much potential, which he will never fulfill if he doesn’t complete his program. I tried to tell him, just go right through. Get your Ph.D. Don’t put it off. Don’t take time out for some silly job. You’re so much smarter than that.”
Bridget was floundering, fairly babbling, on the verge of whining. It was so unlike her that it would have been laughable, had there not been an underlying tone of desperation. There was more to her anxiety than the notion of losing a bright son or gaining an ignorant daughter. No one knew Bridget quite as well as Camille did.
“Why didn’t they stay very long?” Camille asked quietly, the rising anger momentarily quashed.
Bridget looked mystified.
“When they went to your house last night,” Camille clarified, “why didn’t they stay?”
“Because I was just going to bed. They said what they had to say, and I just…I was very tired.” She closed her eyes, shook her head again. “Because I can’t handle this right now.”
“Good.” Camille reached across the corner to touch Bridget’s arm. “Because it’s not yours to handle, Bridget. It’s their choice, their life.” She sat back with a sigh. “I just wish you hadn’t done such a beautiful job with Lauren’s wedding, because now that’s what Jordan wants. A fancy wedding.”
“Oh, fine.” Bridget’s beautiful hands went up as she glanced at the ceiling. “That’s just great. I’m really in the mood for another wedding.”
“Relax.” Camille reached for her again, but Bridget’s glance prompted her to lay her palm on the table. If not the comforting gesture she intended, at least it said truce. “You’re the mother of the groom. All you have to do is show up.”
“In this day and age?” Bridget shot back.
“You said that was all Anthony’s parents did,” Camille reminded her.
“They came from California. What else do you expect?”
“You didn’t let them do anything else, did you?” Camille supposed softly. “Well, you’ve had your wedding. Now it’s time—”
“For my divorce.”
Camille was stunned.
“For your…”
“That’s right.” Even in a whisper, Bridget’s voice rose in desperation. “Tim says he wants a divorce. Can you believe it?”
“Oh, Bridge, I’m—”
“Incredible, isn’t it? The match made in heaven, the perfect couple, the ideal…” Her eyes avoiding Camille’s, Bridget blinked back tears. “Incredible, isn’t it?”
“It can happen to anyone,” Camille insisted. “But maybe you two need some professional help.”
“We’ve already thought of that. He has his attorney, and I have mine.” Bridget gave a deep, long sigh. “This isn’t as sudden as I’m making it sound. He agreed not to move out until after the wedding.”
“Do the kids know?”
“They, um…” More blinking, more head shaking. “We haven’t actually talked, not, you know…” She swallowed hard. “I didn’t think he’d really do it. A phase, I thought. Midlife crisis.”
“Is it…?”
“Another woman? If it is, he’s not saying. I’m sure it is. My attorney wants to hire a detective. Do you think I should? Did you?”
“No. I was able to go through tribal court because he’s Indian. It was pretty civilized. He kept his stuff, and I kept mine. He made no claim on the house—said the house belongs to the woman. He agreed to let Jordan stay with me.” Camille’s wan smile was meant to be apologetic, but in the back of her mind she had a nasty, niggling thought. No one else took you for the perfect couple, Bridget. Just you. “I guess that’s not much help.”
“Didn’t you feel like cutting him up into small pieces and just…?”
“The anger becomes more manageable after a while.”
“You make it sound so clinical. Anger management, for God’s sake. You were madder than hell, weren’t you? You, Camille. You were spitting nails when we weren’t looking.” Bridget glanced warily at the door to the kitchen. “Please tell me you were.”
“I was angry with him most of the time toward the end. Sometimes I didn’t even know why. I just knew that I couldn’t live with him anymore. The way he lived wasn’t the way I wanted us to live.”
“Was he screwing around?” Bridget whispered. “Don’t look at me like it’s none of my business. We’ve known each other forever, and now we’re both in the same boat, more or less. He was, wasn’t he? He must have been.”
“He never admitted it.”
It was less than Bridget wanted to hear and more than Camille intended to say.
“I never thought it could happen to us. I thought…” Bridget gave another tremulous sigh. “You know, we had our home, our family, our friends, our life. We agreed on everything, all the ground rules. We even went to church. How could he be such a hypocrite, sitting right next to me in church?” She shook her head once more. “I never thought it could happen to me.”
“Neither did I.”
“I know. Everybody’s going to be totally shocked. You’re the first person outside the family that I’ve told. Of course, I don’t know how many people he’s told. He’s probably sending out—”
“No, Bridget. You missed the point. Neither did I think it could happen to me. I was just as confident as you were. I believed in our marriage.” She smiled, remembering the conversation she’d had with Jordan and Mama the day after Lauren’s wedding. Since then she’d thought a lot about her mother’s observations on failure and success in marriage. What was the standard? Was it appearances?
She tipped her head consideringly. “In some ways, now that I think about it, I still do. Some ways, some days.”
“You never got over Creed, did you? That’s where that anger management gets you. I’ll get over Timothy Mayfield, believe you me.”
“But not the marriage. Even after the marriage is over, you’ll never be over the marriage. It’ll always be part of you, part of your life, because it was a marriage. For better or for worse. You choose.”
Bridget pushed away from the table. “I’m not ready for quite this much wisdom, Cam. I want sympathy.”
“You have mine.”
“I’m not ready to tell Ellie yet.” Again she glanced at the doorway to the kitchen.
By now Ellie and Mama had undoubtedly figured out the gist of what was going on. They were pretty quiet. Either they had their mouths filled with chicken salad or their ears to the wall. Maybe both. But they would hang out together in the kitchen until Camille gave some signal.
“Ellie and Stan,” Bridget mused. “Who’d have guessed they’d be the ones to make it the longest?”
“Did we have a contest going?”
“Of course not. No, you’re right, it makes perfect sense. They’re both such nice, steady, everyday people.”
“We aren’t?”
“We’re more high-maintenance. Not to mention our former and soon-to-be-former husbands. You’re an artist, and I’m…” Bridget turned to her, looking lost, so lost. “I don’t know. What am I, Cam? I’m a college graduate. That’s something. I’m…” Shaking, shaking. “What am I going to do?”
“You’re going to take it one step at a time.” Camille managed to catch Bridget’s hand in hers this time. It was cold and trembling. Nothing to do but hang on. “Our kids are getting married, Bridge. Let’s think about that for a minute. James and Jordan.”
“I think it’s a mistake. They haven’t thought this out.” She shook her head again, this time firmly and in her own control. “I have to go, Cam. I don’t…I’m talked out. I can’t deal with another wedding. And I don’t want Tim there if there is a wedding. I especially don’t want—”
“You know what, Bridget, they just got engaged. We’ve got plenty of time to work all this out. This will be a small, intimate wedding. Simple and elegant. I know my daughter. She’s not going to go overboard.” Camille held on when Bridget tried to draw away. “We’ve got the same situation on our side. I don’t even know how to get in touch with Jordan’s father right now. But we won’t let anything ruin this for our kids, Bridget. They’re happy.”
“For how long?”
“For now, Bridge, come on.” Camille squeezed and shook as though she were wringing laundry rather than a limp hand. Suddenly she saw herself, and she almost laughed aloud. Since when had she become the cheerleader type? “A nice, small wedding. When they start making serious plans, I’m sure that’s what they’re going to want.”
Bridget managed a wobbly smile. “Whatever,” she whispered, returning the hand squeeze. “I’m just going to slip out the back, Jack. Okay?”
“Sure?”
Bridget nodded. “Ellie and Rosemary…you’ll explain?”
“Sure.”