“You can come out now.” Camille gave the two sheepish faces a moment to appear, one on each side of the kitchen door. “Cowards.”
Ellie gave a small shrug. “I thought you two had things to work out.”
“You heard?”
Both women nodded.
“The rest of the story,” Rosemary intoned.
“Oh, Mama.”
“Well, Bridget’s always been just a little too high and mighty.” Rosemary offered Camille a cup of coffee in one hand, a yield sign with the other. “I know, I know. This is a bad time to say that, but it’s true. Of course, I’m sorry for her troubles.” With the handoff complete, she folded her arms beneath droopy breasts. “But she’d better not try to spoil things for those kids, or I’ll show her trouble.”
“Mama!” The quick protest was necessary to thwart the speaking of the other of Camille’s two minds—the one that was thinking the same way. “She won’t try to spoil anything. Once the bandwagon starts rolling, she’ll want to be right up there in the driver’s seat.”
“Which could turn out to be the rest of the rest of the story,” Ellie said.
“We’ll handle it. You two are going to help, right? No more sneaking off, then eavesdropping when things get touchy.”
“We weren’t eavesdropping.”
“We just heard bits and pieces. We couldn’t help it.”
Camille snorted. “I didn’t hear you rattling any pots and pans to drown out the tête-à-tête you didn’t want to hear.”
“We were just about to bring in the food when we heard the big D word, and we don’t mean Dallas,” Rosemary explained. She drew two puzzled looks. “I just heard that song on the radio. ‘Goin Through the Big D.’”
“What station are you listening to these days, Mama? Golden country oldies?”
“I listen to all kinds of golden oldies these days. I kinda like the fact that you can’t be golden until you’re an oldie.”
Camille started spooning chicken salad onto three plates. “I hope it’s just the music that has you feeling so chipper.”
“It’s the wedding,” Rosemary gushed. Catching Camille’s glance, she adjusted tone and tune. “Oh, I’m sorry about Bridget splitting up with her husband, but I never thought he was such a prize. Seems like he’s always trying to convince people that his time is more precious than anyone else’s.” She took the two plates Camille handed her. “You ask me, he drove his son away.”
“Oh, Mama. James grew up and moved away.”
“I think there was more to it. ’Course, I could be wrong.” Her tone canceled out the possibility. Headed for the dining room, Rosemary dropped crumbs of wisdom for the next generation to follow. “One thing I can’t be wrong about is James. He’s a good man. I generally know one when I see one.”
“Generally?”
“Some are more obvious, and others are late bloomers. But generally.” Rosemary set the two plates on either side of the head of the table, the place that was now Camille’s. “James is the kind you don’t miss your guess on. The obvious kind.”
“So he comes with a guarantee?”
“Only mine,” Rosemary said. “Oh, the fruit. Ellie, help yourself to some fruit. That big ol’ dish is too heavy to pass.”
“That’s no ordinary dish, Mama. That’s a compote.”
“She’s learning,” Rosemary whispered to Ellie as they passed each other—Ellie bringing the coffeepot, Rosemary going back for something nearly forgotten.
“This doesn’t look like an ordinary spoon either,” Ellie said, handing Camille the ornate silver serving piece she had just used in helping herself to fruit.
“Eight million heirlooms in the house, and every one has a story.”
“Take notes,” Ellie advised, her voice dropping to a whisper on Rosemary’s return.
“I went out and got the mail earlier. This is your pile.” Rosemary placed several ordinary envelopes beside the fork at Camille’s place before taking her own seat with an armload of books and magazines. She set her collection in the chair next to hers—the one Bridget had left empty. “And this is my pile.”
“I thought you’d weaned yourself off those Internet auctions, Mama.”
“Not completely. I’m still a registered blue-star buyer. I was just browsing, and these caught my eye. I had a feeling. Or a wish, maybe, I don’t know.” She presented exhibit number one: Martha Stewart. “Wedding books.” Number two: Minnesota Bride. “Magazines galore. I got a bunch of them for ten cents on the dollar, and that’s counting the postage. All fairly recent.”
When she heard neither oohs nor aahs, she assumed ignorance.
“Ideas, my dear girls. Styles. Tips. I’ll need to get started on Jordan’s dream dress. What do you think she wants?” Food went untouched as Rosemary flipped through pages. “I’m betting on simplicity. Something that flows over her body like sweet cream.”
“Mama, I really think you’re jumping the gun, bargain or not. They haven’t even set a date.”
“Once they pick a month or even a season, the church and the reception hall will set the date.” Rosemary glanced from face to face, astonished. “There’s a lot to be done, no matter what the date turns out to be. Your friend Bridget will back me up on this just as soon as she’s able to get on board.”
“She’s already told me how much planning a wedding requires,” Camille said with a groan. “Over and over and over again.”
“Maybe she can use the distraction to help her get through that big D,” Ellie said.
“Jordan’s wedding will not be somebody else’s distraction from whatever is going on in her own life,” Camille insisted.
Her mother gave her one of her loaded looks. “How about from what’s not going on?”
“I didn’t mean you, Mama.”
“That’s funny. Neither did I.”
Ellie cleared her perfectly clear throat. “I don’t know what either one of you is talking about, but I do know that Rosemary’s right about booking the facilities. That’s the first challenge. Judging by the last Mayfield wedding, you need to think big.”
“This is going to be a Delonga wedding.”
“Jordan’s last name is Burke,” Rosemary reminded her. “Careful, Camille. You don’t want to start sounding like Bridget already.”
“Poor Bridget,” Ellie said. “She’s always been one to do one thing at a time and do it very well. But you can’t pile too many things on her at once or you’ll strip her threads and she’ll screw right out from under you.”
“Divorce isn’t something most people do very well.” Camille picked through her salad, separating a chunk of chicken from a slice of celery. “She did a nice job with Lauren’s wedding, but I know that Jordan has very different ideas. It’ll be simple. Bridget will have to cut down the list on that side, because it’ll be small and elegant if I know my daughter.” She smiled suddenly. “By the way, Ellie, they’d like you to sing for them. That’s the first detail they’ve decided on.”
“I’ll be happy to, but if that choice is any indication of things to come, maybe you don’t know your daughter as well as you think you do.” Camille’s quizzical look made Ellie laugh. “I’m hardly small and elegant.”
In the middle of the night the phone rang, rudely snatching Camille away from the craziest dream. In it, she’d been modeling a fluffy white dress for her mother while Ellie and Bridget did a line dance in front of the three-way mirror and crooned “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?”
Somehow too embarrassed to turn the light on, she knocked the phone off its cradle.
“Mrs. Burke? It’s James,” said a deep voice. “James Mayfield.”
Camille still hadn’t opened her eyes, still hadn’t made the transition. Everything in her head was still silly, so she laughed. “Hello, James Mayfield. You’re the only person who calls me—”
“Mrs. Burke, my mother needs help, and I don’t know what to do for her. I know it’s late, but can you come over right away?”
“Is she sick?” Couldn’t be. A moment ago she was doing the Achy Breaky Shake. “Is she hurt? Should I call—”
“No, she told me not to call anyone, but I’m scared for her. She’s kinda wigged out.”
“Wigged out?” Bridget was out of wigs? She didn’t wear wigs. But Camille was sitting up now. “Does she need—”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what she needs. Can you come? I know it’s late.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“Thanks.” His sigh was long and deep and full of unwarranted relief. “Please hurry.”
Camille grabbed her robe off the bedpost, turned on the hall light, and headed for the kitchen and the door to the garage. Along the way she thought to pull her purse off a chair and leave a note on the kitchen counter. At the closet she had a choice between clogs and ankle-high boots. Since the last of the early-spring snow was confined to dirty ridges along the driveway, the clogs would ordinarily be her preference. But that stupid song had her zipping her bare feet into the boots. She pulled on her coat and headed out.
About ten minutes later she approached the sprawling Mayfield house. It was the only one on the street in the posh suburban neighborhood with lights on inside. Camille parked her van in the driveway beside James’s car. She found the front door unlocked, so she let herself in. Down the hall to the left, she could hear water running in the bathroom sink and a woman desperately trying to control a crying jag.
In the darkened living room to the right, a masculine silhouette rose from a chair. “Mrs. Burke?” he whispered tentatively.
Camille shed her coat, unzipped the boots, and flipped them off her feet. One of them hit the wall.
“What’s going on, James?”
“She called me and told me she was sorry about a bunch of stuff that didn’t make any sense. She sounded drunk or something. I didn’t know what was going on, so I came over.”
The sobbing down the hall suddenly abated.
His voice dropped as he approached. “She said she couldn’t sleep, and then she started in about being sorry again, and now she can’t stop crying. I can’t do anything. I try to talk to her, she just gets worse.”
“Is she on any kind of medication?”
“I don’t know.” They stood face to face in the shadowy foyer. “You know about my father.”
“I know he’s asked for a divorce.” Camille caught herself clutching the front of her bathrobe and wishing she’d taken time to get dressed. This was, after all, her daughter’s fiancé.
But he sounded just as scared as he had the time he’d sneaked one of Creed’s guitars out of its case and dropped it on the cement floor in her workshop.
“She’s having some kind of a breakdown, Mrs. Burke. I don’t know how to get her to settle down. She’s…” His gesture, a pointed plea, directed her to the sliver of light that escaped the bathroom door and sliced the dark hallway in half.
Camille leaned close to the door. “Bridget?”
The door swung open. Bridget’s whole face was red and swollen from crying, and her hair, backlit by the bulbs surrounding the mirror, stood on end at wild angles. But the look in her bloodshot eyes was far wilder.
“What are you doing here?” Bridget demanded. “It’s the middle of the night, for God’s sake.”
“I just wanted to make sure you’re all right.”
“Of course I’m all right.” Bridget shouldered past Camille, going after James. “You called her, didn’t you? What for?”
“I didn’t know what else to do, Mom.”
“This is family business, James.” Trapped, she did a quarter turn, as though she wanted to keep an eye on both of them at once. “I was having trouble sleeping, and James was always such a night owl that I called him just to talk. He’s making a big deal—”
“You’re not making any sense, Mom.”
“If you want to be a good husband, you’re going to have to learn a thing or two about women, dear. Sometimes they cry. You’ll have to learn to handle a woman’s tears if you’re going to get married, because women cry sometimes. And you can’t just walk out.”
“I’m not,” he said quietly. “I won’t. I just don’t want you to…” He reached cautiously, as though she were a bird on a branch. “You had me a little scared, you know?”
“Isn’t that just like a man? They can’t handle emotion. It disgusts them.”
“I’m not disgusted, Mom. I just don’t know how to help you.” He took a step back, pitifully unsure of himself and looking to Camille for support. “Maybe I shouldn’t have called you. I’ve never seen her the way she was a few minutes ago. She—”
“Don’t talk about me as though I weren’t here.” Bridget dug deep for a reserve of motherly clout. “I’m right here.”
“Well, yeah, you seem to be now, but a few minutes ago I wasn’t so sure, Mom. Are you okay now?”
“Yes, of course. I’m not a lunatic, James. You make it sound as though I’m some sort of lunatic, but I’m not. I’m just not sleeping very well anymore.”
“Have you seen a doctor, Bridge?”
“For what? Drugs? I don’t need any more drugs. They make me crazy, and I can’t afford to be crazy.” But her agitation level was on the rise. “I’m sorry I disturbed you, James.” Unexpectedly, she pushed past Camille. “I’m sorry my son disturbed you, Camille. I’m sorry. I know I look like a fool, and I’m really, really sorry.”
“It’s all right, Bridge, we’re not—”
“You go on home now. Both of you. I’ll be fine.” She backed into her bedroom, receding like a pale specter evaporating in the darkness. The door closed. The lock clicked.
The crying started again.
“Should I take her to a hospital?” James asked.
“No!” Bridget screamed. “I’m staying here in my house! This is my house!”
“Shit.”
“You don’t have to go anywhere, Bridge,” Camille said through the door. With a gesture she reassured James. “And I don’t feel like it either. How about if I sleep over?”
“Oh, Cam,” Bridget moaned. “Why would you want to do that?”
“Why would I want to drive home now?”
No answer.
“Seriously. I came over here in my nightgown.” She had been to the dentist earlier that week, and she half smiled as she remembered an item that was still in her purse. “I brought my toothbrush.”
No answer.
Camille injected some sternness into her voice. “Bridget, open the door and say good night to your son. Let him see that you’re okay.”
“He’s seen enough,” Bridget shouted. And then she groaned. Finally she whispered, “James, thank you for coming over. Go back to your apartment, back to bed, back to your—”
“Open the door, Mom.” He gave the knob a couple of futile twists. “I’m not leaving until you let us come in and make sure you’re okay.”
Punctuated by slow, audible, shaky breaths taken on the other side of the door, a long moment passed.
Finally the door opened. “Camille can stay with me,” Bridget said sullenly. She lifted an unsteady hand. “I’m sorry for all this, James.”
“There’s nothing for you to apologize about, Mom.” He took the hand she held out to him.
“Then I won’t. I’m not sorry. Go get some sleep now.”
“You sure?”
She nodded.
He seemed relieved to be able to back down the hallway. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“James?”
He stopped, waited.
“Please try to forget how badly I’ve behaved.”
James left on a quick, desperate nod.
After they heard the front door close, Bridget turned to Camille. “He’s going to make some woman a fine husband.”
“Promise?”
“You know the saying ‘Like father, like son’?”
Camille nodded hesitantly.
“He’s not,” Bridget quickly assured her. “As it turns out, that’s not a bad thing.”
“We’ll talk about the fathers and the children later, Bridget. Right now let’s take care of you.” Camille put her arm around her friend and eased her into the lonely darkness of the master bedroom. “You’re shaking. What can I get for you?”
“I do have something that I’m supposed to take to help me sleep.”
“Have you taken any tonight?”
“No.”
Bridget flipped on the light. Like much of the house, the bedroom had been professionally decorated, with original artwork, fine furniture, all the bedding and drapery coordinated to match the wallpaper and carpeting in the latest shades of green and whatever they were calling beige these days. She blinked several times, as though it were all suddenly unfamiliar.
“I think I left it…” Bridget’s hand fluttered in the direction of what she called the dressing room, which was an overblown closet with enough built-in storage to house clothing for a family of five. And Bridget had enough clothes for a family of five.
Camille found the prescription bottle on top of a built-in bureau, along with an open purse and a set of keys. She checked the label—filled that day—and compared the number on the prescription to the pills in the bottle. Why hadn’t Bridget taken any? Did she enjoy lying awake counting her husband’s sins?
Sometimes, Camille admitted to herself. Sometimes the only pleasure to be had was just that perverse.
Bridget sat on the side of her bed, looking as though she didn’t know where to put herself. Camille placed the medication in her quivering palm and insisted that she drink the whole glass of water.
Bridget gave a shaky sigh as she handed up the glass. “You know exactly how I feel, don’t you?”
“I think I do.”
Bridget looked up slowly, big hangdog eyes swimming in tears. “When people say they know how you feel, they don’t,” she muttered softly as she allowed herself to be placed, limb by limb, in a prone position. “Even if they’ve had a death or a divorce or whatever. They don’t because they’re not you. But we’ve been shoulder to shoulder for so long, you and I. We’re so much alike.”
We aren’t at all alike, Camille thought. There were times when she wondered what they saw in each other, why they still got together regularly, how each tolerated the differences in the other’s personality, how they had anything to talk about when their interests were so different, not to mention their values. She had more in common with Ellie. But she and Bridget had been together in the important times.
“Almost like sisters,” Bridget said.
“In many ways we’re closer than sisters.”
“We are, aren’t we? We’ve shared so much, Cam. And now this.”
“This?”
“Divorce.”
“Sisters don’t get divorced, Bridge.” She climbed into the huge bed and turned off the light. “Neither do friends.”
“You know what I mean. It’s so unreal, Cam.” Bridget turned on her side, and her voice traveled through the dark, across the long road of pillows, all the way to Camille’s ear, oddly like the innocent bearer of sleepover secrets. “I wake up in the morning, and for a moment I think it’s going to be a regular day. And then I remember. There aren’t any regular days anymore. No more nice days. They’re all full of holes and bare spots. It’s like I’ve been in an accident, hit by a train or a meteor. Wham! My head’s spinning, and everything around me is all disjointed.” Near silence. Then, shyly, “Was it like that for you?”
“Pretty much.”
Not at all. Camille’s course had seemed crystal clear, even though every step had been painful. If they stayed together, she would keep asking him to change, and he wasn’t going to do it. If he left, she would stop asking. If he moved out, she would move on.
“Did you hate him?” Bridget wanted to know.
“Yes.” When she worked at it, she could hate him.
“Then why does it hurt so much to lose him?”
“It just does. There are too many reasons for you to deal with right now, Bridge. It just does.”
Bridget finally talked herself to sleep. If the pills did their job, she would sleep most of the day away.
But Camille hadn’t taken any drugs, and all the talk of hatred and hurting didn’t help her rest in the presence of her friend’s pain. She’d lain awake all night, then slipped away early, promising herself that she would call James and let him know that his mother was alone but sound asleep.
The morning light played over the bare branches of the sugar maples and the old oak trees that surrounded her house. The daffodils on the south side had just begun to poke through soggy sod. Camille checked the newspaper box and wondered whether they’d lost their carrier. The paper was late again. She found the front door unlocked and wondered whether she was at fault.
But she found the culprit in the kitchen, sipping on coffee he’d apparently just made. The newspaper lay on the table beside the black cowboy hat that was Creed Burke’s trademark. His boots had already left a scuff on the linoleum. His scent had probably already marked the erstwhile female territory. That fatal spark in his dark eyes made its claim on her sensibilities. And unfortunately it all felt good.
She hoped he couldn’t tell.
His lean face was craggier than it had been in those early, innocent days, but his slow smile softened it, just as it always had.
“Hello, Camille.”