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Kelly waited until Saturday morning to call her in-laws to discuss their plans. By that time, she was convinced she could act professionally, not reveal the pain she was feeling as the last of her children left the nest.
She sat at the kitchen counter, her planner and notepad in front of her. Paper was more natural for notes and initial thoughts.
“Good morning, Ruth,” she said to her mother-in-law when she answered. “Peter got your company’s letter a few days ago. I wanted to call to discuss arrangements with you for the summer. I assume he’ll be staying with you?”
A formal way to begin, but it was best. California breezy didn’t work on Boston uptight.
“Yes, my dear,” Ruth answered. “We are delighted to have Peter. Why don’t you come as well? It would be great to have you in the city. It would be good for you to get out after the unfortunate event. Almost a year has passed. It’s time to re-enter society.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible. Thank you, though,” she added belatedly.
“Oh? Do you have other plans?”
“Well, I had hoped to take Peter on one last trip before he went to college.”
“You can certainly take some trips from here. The house on The Vineyard would be available. Perhaps Lisa can come as well.”
For thirty seconds, she was tempted. The house, more a mansion, on the island was beautiful, and island life peaceful.
But the cost was too high.
“No, that’s fine. Since we received the letter, I’ve been making plans for myself. To go to Europe. Italy, maybe.”
“Italy is all the rage these days. We will miss you. Though I know Peter will be very busy learning the ropes at the business and finding his way around Boston. We will have some parties for him as well. It will be a great opportunity for him to become part of the family operation.”
And for the Richards clan to get their claws into her son. Unfortunately, it couldn’t be helped. John had groomed Peter for his eventual role, and her son had taken to it like the proverbial duck in water.
She nailed down the details with Ruth. She’d have exactly one week with Peter after school ended, and having gone through it with Lisa, she knew he’d want to spend that time with his friends. It was going to be a long summer and fall until they came home for Thanksgiving.
Ruth tried once more to get Kelly to come to Boston, but Kelly wanted no part of the routine, in spite of the fact she’d been born and raised in the city. Somehow, her spirit had never taken up residence there.
She hung up the phone and completed her notes. There were things that she’d need to go over with Peter: making sure he knew about his medical insurance, setting up an account for him to draw from for books, food, and other essentials. He would need to learn to budget, but they’d funded both kids’ college funds well.
She closed the notebook and looked around. The house was still in good shape from the cleaning firm’s job. A little pickup was all she needed to do before the end-of-year teacher gathering in her house. She often hosted, as she had one of the larger places. The pool was always a draw.
Only a few others lived in the pricy town. John’s salary and stock income had paid for the house. On a teacher’s salary, she would have been relegated with the others to a small apartment or repurposed beach shack.
Peter was spending the day with a few friends, so she had the house to herself. She wandered to the piano, sat, and opened the lid. Tentatively, she played a few scales. Every once in a while, she pulled out a book with a yellow cover and attempted one of Chopin’s études. She could hear her last piano teacher, a Greek woman with a book-crammed studio in her house. The space barely contained enough room for the piano, a white bust of Beethoven, and the woman’s larger-than-life gestures.
“Caress the keys,” she would tell her. “With Chopin, you must always caress. Bach requires you to have a drumbeat in your head, and Beethoven needs your soul. But Chopin is a man caressing the skin of his lover.”
The words had made her uncomfortable at the time, but they’d stuck.
But today she didn’t have the patience for Chopin. Instead, she plunked out a few choruses of “Chopsticks,” stood, and bowed to the imaginary audience. Then she closed the lid and turned to face John’s office.
Ruth was right about one thing: it was time to start moving on. Oh, not drastically. At forty-four, it was too late to change the trajectory of her life. Being a concert pianist was out. Instead she’d learned the rules for being a good wife, mother, and teacher and obeyed them all. It had been simpler that way. There was no drama. And after living with her parents, she’d been very tired of the conflict her mother seemed to consider an art form.
No, it was time to clean out John’s office. Could she make it her own? She’d always done her work at the dining room table or kitchen counter. Officially, she had an office upstairs that contained piles and drawers of music, lesson plans, and handouts from long-over courses. But she preferred to do her planning in the middle of her family, there when either of her children needed her.
If she did move her work in here, she’d need new furniture. John’s sharp-angled desk with its single drawer didn’t appeal to her. The white surface was covered over with papers she’d gotten from the various agencies. She’d read through them, made her decisions, then tossed them on his desk, like they were unfinished business for him to handle.
Somewhere in that pile was the unopened manila envelope the police had given her when they’d finished their investigation. One of the things in there was his wallet, an expensive leather billfold she’d given him as a gift one Christmas when Lisa was about ten.
There was something about a man’s wallet that seemed to contain his essence. Maybe because he carried it so close to him and opened it multiple times a day. Unlike women’s purses, a man held onto his wallet until it was barely usable, a familiar piece of him.
Kelly knew if she held that object in her hand, she would collapse into grief, regressing months in the cycle. The envelope would be the last thing she opened.
She sat in his desk chair and tried the lone drawer. Locked. She didn’t remember a key anywhere. It might be in the envelope, too.
She glanced at the functional but up-to-date filing cabinets. Their keys were hanging from their locks. It was as good a place to start as any. Most of it could go back to his corporate office, where someone else would deal with it.
Retrieving the boxes she’d stored in the utility room, she opened the top drawer and began.
“DO YOU NEED ANY HELP?” Kelly’s friend Gail asked as she followed her into the kitchen, carrying an artfully created vegetable platter with scattered petunias and a radish rose centerpiece.
“I think I have it all under control. Drinks are in here, along with glasses. I’m leaving the food, plates, and cutlery on the dining room table so the wind doesn’t get to them. Tables and chairs are set up outside. I’ve laid a stack of beach towels for anyone who wants to swim.”
“Prepared as always—you have the precision of a marching band.”
“Funny.”
“I try.” Gail grinned.
Although Kelly was close to many of the teachers she’d taught with over the last almost twenty years, Gail was the one she confided in the most. They had lunches out at least once a month, often down at one of the touristy beach towns where they could amble through the shops afterward. Most of the time they came home with a seashell creation of some kind or another. They declared it was in support of the local art community.
“More like the support of your local beach bum,” John had commented more than once. He’d had a dim view of the surfing crowd.
“So what are you going to do now that Peter won’t be here for the summer?” Gail asked. “I’m guessing Lisa won’t be either?”
Kelly shook her head. “She’s got a job up in San Francisco and is staying with her boyfriend’s family. Good thing. I don’t know how she’d afford the rent otherwise.”
“That was fast.”
“She’s head over heels, according to her. I hope it doesn’t come crashing down. They’re awfully young.”
“Are you going east with Peter then?” Gail asked.
“Heaven forbid! I don’t know. I guess I’ll just stay around here. I told my in-laws I was going to Italy, but I’ll tell them I couldn’t get tickets.”
“You should go somewhere.”
“Uh-huh. Maybe we can do a long weekend at a spa or something.”
“Not happening. I leave the week after school ends, remember? Our annual pilgrimage to the old country so my children can ‘absorb their Japanese roots’— my mother-in-law’s term for learning to be more obedient. They’re both boys, so they don’t have to change too much to make her happy. They learned how to fake it a long time ago.”
“I thought you weren’t comfortable there.”
“I’m not. She doesn’t think I’m a good influence—not traditional enough and too opinionated. But I do it for my husband. He’s a man who honors his parents, so we go.” She shrugged. “What can I say? After all these years, he still makes my heart go thumpity-thump.”
Kelly laughed as the doorbell rang.
Soon the place was filled with chatter as the teachers told classroom tales and talked about summer plans. One or two of them actually were going to Europe, and Kelly found herself with the itch of jealousy. If only she’d known.
At one point, she found herself talking with one of the oldest teachers in the school. Tara Johnson had declared she wasn’t retiring until she had to do so. Since all the kids adored her, no one was forcing her from the building.
“So how are you holding up?” Tara asked Kelly. “This is when it gets hard. Everyone else has moved on, but you’re probably stuck with the grief that sneaks up on you now and then. I know it was that way when my husband died.”
Kelly nodded, fighting back as her eyes watered. “It’s weird,” she said. “I mean, all my life I’ve known what to do. I was the support team. I made sure my husband’s and kids’ days ran smoothly. My story wasn’t important, only theirs. And now it’s like the book is closed and there’s nothing more to read.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Tara said. “Of course your story matters. What you do with your life matters. You matter.”
Was the woman right? Was there life beyond an empty nest? Kelly blinked away her tear, as a glimmer of hope lit on the horizon.
