“HE KISSED ME, Gisela.” Clarice paced her friend’s small cookshop. “Just like that, and then he asked me to go home with him to Scotland.”
Gisela pushed a strand of flaxen hair back under her mobcap. “And when he comes tonight, what will you tell him?” she asked, her words directed to the table where she was counting the strawberry tarts Clarice had brought her.
“I don’t know what to tell him. He cannot have been serious, anyway.” Drawing a deep breath, Clarice took the empty basket off her arm and set it on the table. “Watch where you’re running, Mary!”
“You as well, Anne,” Gisela chided her sprite of a child as she watched the two girls race around the cookshop. “You’re making me dizzy.” She reached out a plump hand to stop her daughter’s hectic progress. “Go into the back and fetch Mrs. Bradford two loaves of bread.”
“As you wish, Mama.” Laughing, Anne streaked past a lace curtain and into the next room, Mary close on her heels.
Clarice sighed. “I’m still wondering how it is I invited him to supper. I was leaving to go home and dry off, and the words just came out of my mouth, all by themselves.”
“All by themselves, is it?” When Clarice kept her lips pressed tight, Gisela leaned closer. “You like him, don’t you?”
“He’s good to Mary. Patient. He told her a story. And her eyes light up when—”
“This isn’t about Mary.” With a self-satisfied smile, Gisela counted coins to pay Clarice for the tarts. “It’s true your daughter could use a man in her life. Can’t we all?” Her kind brown eyes sparkled when she laughed. “But this is about you, Clarice, and what you want for yourself.”
“I’ve been happy alone with Mary. After what I went through with Will, I value my independence.”
“And?” The money jingled when Gisela scooped it up.
“He’s young.”
“How young?”
Clarice bit her lip. “Nineteen.”
“A young man, yes, but a man grown. If your age difference doesn’t bother him, why should it bother you? Other women will be envious.” When Clarice rolled her eyes, Gisela handed her the coins. “And?”
The money clinked in Clarice’s hands as she toyed with it, pouring the small pile from one palm to the other. “Scotland. He lives in Scotland. For heaven’s sake, I’ve never even been to London!”
“And?”
She lowered her head, and her voice dropped to a defeated whisper. “My skin tingles when he touches me. I”—she looked up—“I’ve never felt like this before.”
“I felt like that once upon a time.” Gisela’s words sounded far away, as far away as where she seemed to be staring. “Then Tim succumbed to the smallpox, and here I am…running the cookshop alone. Alone, Clarice.” Her gaze focused on her friend. “It isn’t good to be alone.”
“I have Mary,” Clarice said doggedly.
And I’m terrified, she added to herself.
“For how many years will you have her?” Gisela asked. “They grow. They grow and they’re gone. You cannot live your life through a child, my dear. That wouldn’t be fair to either of you.”