A Woman's Place: A Novel (3 page)

And she was right. Not only was she in the hospital all those days when I wasn't, but she saw a different, more judgmental side of Connie. She was the one who bore the brunt of Connie's frustration. No, I didn't blame her for wanting time off. Given a choice, I'd have been anywhere else, too, because it was painful watching my mother die. No matter how often I visited the hospital, each time I turned into that room and saw her suffering, it hit me like the first time. No matter how long I sat studying her pallor, the next visit I was shocked to find her so pale. No matter how deftly I distracted my mind when I wasn't with her or how tired I was climbing into bed, I lay awake grieving. Page 12

Barbara Delinsky - A Woman's Place

The children stayed until Tuesday. Saying goodbye to their grandmother was only the first of our trials. We arrived at the airport to learn that incoming planes had been delayed by hurricane rains whipping up the East Coast. Departure times were moved back, and back, and back. I called Dennis--at work, at home, once, twice, three times--and left messages when he didn't answer.

Johnny started worrying about missing practice.

Kikit started worrying about Dennis missing their plane. Their departure time was delayed yet again. I left new messages for Dennis.

Johnny cried that he really didn't want to be benched, because the team they were playing that Saturday sucked, so his had the best chance of winning.

Kikit cried--repeatedly--that Michael, Travis, and Joy were in her suitcase and scared to death of getting lost, and what did happen to luggage during delays?

I wasn't any happier than the children. I didn't like them flying alone to begin with, but when I suggested they wait for better weather the next morning, Johnny got so upset about missing practice that I relented. The airline finally rerouted them through Baltimore, which made Johnny even more nervous, which had him poking at Kikit, who came crying to me, and all I could do was to leave another message for Dennis and put the children on the plane with lingering hugs and the sworn word of the flight attendant that she would hand-deliver them to Dennis at Logan.

I returned to the hospital with one eye on the clock and continued to try Dennis. Mostly, accessing the messages on our answering machine, I heard myself. It wasn't until shortly before their original flight would have landed that I reached him.

"You'll be there?" I asked, giving him the new information.

"Of course I'll be there," he answered.

But he wasn't. The children landed at Logan at six. Dennis didn't arrive until six-forty. He claimed that was the time I had told him. It wasn't. But arguing was pointless. All I wanted to do was to calm the children as best I could long distance, then fall into bed. I hadn't slept well all week, never did when I was away from home. I was beat. I put St. Louis off until Thursday to allow an extra day with my mother. One phone call to Brody, and the arrangements were made. Friday, he and I met at the International Home Furnishings show in High Point and put in twelve-hour days from then through Monday, moving from exhibit to exhibit, meeting with sales rep after sales rep. I knew which designs I liked and which would work in our shops. Brody knew which products were well-priced and which would complement our list.

Attuned to my worry about Connie, Brody did Denver and New Orleans for me. I did Atlanta, and, late Tuesday, returned to Cleveland. Rona was thrilled to have the added day off, but I didn't do it for Rona. I didn't even do it as much for Mom as for me. No matter that I was anxious to be home. Connie Grant was the only mother I would ever have. For too long I had lived too far away. Too soon it wouldn't matter. Page 13

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The children were disappointed, but understanding. They were that way with most all of my traveling, but then, having spent their youngest years toddling around the shop, they felt personally involved in my career. They knew the merchandise, knew the jargon, knew a startling amount about each franchise as it opened. They also knew they could call me wherever I was.

In this instance, having just seen their grandmother, they knew how ill she was. If my being there could make her happier, Kikit vowed, I should stay, even if she was missing me to bits herself.

I wished their father had been half as gracious. He made me swear to be home on the Thursday afternoon flight.

That last Wednesday, Mother seemed stronger. She actually talked of coming east for Thanksgiving, and, while the doctors thought it improbable, I clung to the thought. Meeting Grandma at the airport had become standard holiday fare. The kids counted on her coming. So did I. She insisted I call them so she could talk, and was disappointed when we got the answering machine. I figured that getting the machine was good news. "Dennis must have them out doing something good." Mother's expression grew wistful. "So easy, with those two. They're wonderful children--articulate, mature--different from each other but so special. You're a better mother than I was."

"No, I'm not. I've been lucky, that's all."

"Luck has little to do with it. People make their luck."

"Maybe some of it. But not all. We have been lucky, Dennis, the kids, and me. Aside from Kikit's allergies, we've been healthy. The children have nice friends, they do well in school. Johnny worries me. He pressures himself to do well. But bless him, he does do well."

"Takes after his mother," mine said. "My friends see your stores all the time. They ask about buying stock." Her brows rose in question.

"No, no. No public offering."

"Why not?"

"No need. We're not expanding so fast. I like having control. I like being personally involved with my franchisees. Much bigger, and I'll lose that."

"But think of the money."

I already had plenty of money. Connie knew I thought so, since we'd had this discussion before. In the past she might have argued anyway. This time, looking weak, she let it ride.

"Well, anyway, I am proud of you, Claire." I knew that. Not once, from my childhood to the present, had her faith in my competence wavered. She trusted me. She believed in me. I leveled my shoulders. "I'm proud of me, too."

"Is Dennis?"

My shoulders didn't stay quite as level. "Hard to tell. He doesn't say so in as many words."

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"How's his own work?"

"I wish I knew, but he doesn't say much about that, either." I hesitated. It seemed wrong to be complaining, what with Connie so sick. But she had always been my sounding board, and, damn it, she wasn't gone yet. "I don't understand it sometimes. You'd think he would want to toss ideas around. I may not have a business degree like he does, but I do have some sense of what works and what doesn't. But he keeps everything to himself. Like it's a power play. Like he won't risk my shooting him down. Fat chance of that. For years and years I've held my tongue when I doubted something he did."

"You should have spoken up."

"He would have hated it when I was right and blamed me when I was wrong, no winning for me, nothing for him but wounded male pride." I smiled.

"Anyway, Brody thinks well of the group he met with last week. With any luck, Dennis will convince them he's the man who can gather the backers to keep them afloat."

Connie didn't argue with my reference to luck that time. Nor did she remind me that, while she wished ever more for me, I was already successful enough in my own right not to need a penny of what Dennis earned. We both took the kind of comfort from that that only people who had once been overboard without a life jacket could feel.

"I do want to see Dennis succeed," she said.

"So do I."

"I'm not ready to die."

"I'm not ready to let you go."

She gave me another one of those woman-to woman looks then, and, bound to her as I would never be to another living soul, I felt such a surge of love and grief that my eyes filled and my throat went tight. Beyond love and grief was admiration. Connie Grant was mulish. Hard as life had been, she had always pushed on. Often, now, she was so weak she could barely lift an arm, so nauseated she could barely eat, so riddled with pain she could barely think. Still she refused to die.

"You're a stubborn woman," I said when I could speak.

"Well, what choice do I have?" she countered. "The alternative is--what--defeatism? But then you end up worse. You don't put dinner on the table by walking away from the kitchen. Your sister never learned that. She could have made something of herself, if she hadn't been so bent on finding the quickest solution. Want a tan? Stand in a booth. Want money? Marry rich. I thought she would have seen me working hard and learned by example. Not Rona. She wants it bigger and better and faster. Well, sometimes that isn't possible. Sometimes the best you can do is the best you can do."

She sank back, momentarily spent. Her eyes were closed, her breathing shallow. While I watched, fearful at first, then calmer, she rested and regrouped. When she opened her eyes, she was mellow. "Claire, Claire, you're like my own mother Kate. She was resourceful. Determined." Her eyes took on a faraway cast, her mouth a fond quirk. "There was a story. I'd nearly forgotten. Sweet Kate and her pearls." I had never heard about any pearls. "Grandmother Kate was dirt poor." Page 15

Barbara Delinsky - A Woman's Place

"Poor in things, not thoughts. Her pearls were moments--one beautiful one and another and another, strung together on a fine, strong thread. Bits of sand, well, she just brushed them aside and forgot them. Some people, she said, couldn't see the pearls through the sand, or only had the strength of character to push away sand from a few pearls and ended up with chokers. Your grandmother Kate's strand was quite long. Yours will be, too. Rona, well, Rona won't apply herself long enough to one thing to create a pearl. Me," she sighed, "I'm still working at it. Seeing the children, seeing you--they're good times, Claire. Better than morphine, you know? You'll come see me again soon, won't you, baby?" The story of Grandmother Kate's pearls was one of the more philosophical ones my mother had shared. I thought about it through the flight home Thursday, thought of my own pearls--wonderful family moments, so many I couldn't count, moments of pleasure and pride at work--and suddenly the dislocation I had been feeling all week intensified. I couldn't get home fast enough.

My plane landed on time. The driver was there to meet me on time. Incredibly, my impatience grew. I had been away too long and needed to be home, needed to touch the children, needed to talk with Dennis. I needed to do all those hated things like washing dishes, folding laundry, vacuuming carpets, making beds. Home was my anchor. I needed to be moored.

When I arrived at the house, it was five-thirty, just when I had told the children to expect me. I was surprised that they weren't waiting outside--two beautiful little pearls of my own, Johnny hanging off the front porch rail, Kikit playing hopscotch along the gently curved walk. It was warm out and still light. Dennis should have had them picked up and home half an hour before. Sure enough, his car was parked by the garage at the side of the house. I went to the front door with my luggage, and had to use my key, another surprise. Whoever arrived home first usually unlocked both doors for the children, who were then in and out until dusk.

"Hello?" I called.

I waited for the answering shrieks that usually hailed my arrival from the kitchen straight ahead, or the upstairs, but got none, and the silence was the least of what unsettled me. Aside from my own bags at the very bottom, the stairs leading to the second floor were clean. There were none of the sneakers, backpacks, sweaters, and other miscellaneous items that usually gathered while I was gone.

"Hey, you guys, I'm home."

"I hear," Dennis said, materializing in the doorway of the study on my right. He was holding a bourbon on-the-rocks. It looked to be his first, his eyes were that clear and focused.

Maternal instinct--personal instinct--no matter, I felt a fast unease.

"What's wrong?" I asked into the silence, knowing that something was and fearing, fearing--Kikit sick, Johnny injured, Connie gone. "What's wrong?" I repeated, whispering this time.

Dennis put his shoulder to the door frame and studied his drink. When he looked back at me, his expression was odd.

"Is it my mother?"

He shook his head.

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"Then the kids."

"They're fine."

"Where are they?"

"At my parents' house."

My in-laws lived just over the New Hampshire line, an easy thirty minutes away. I could understand their helping Dennis with the children while I was gone, though not at the very time I was coming home. Johnny and Kikit were as anxious to see me as I was to see them. "Should I go pick them up?"

"No." His voice was as odd as his expression, colder than usual, firmer than usual. I had a sudden flash to another discussion, one we'd had several months ago. That one had started with spit and fire before reaching the colder than usual, firmer than usual stage in which Dennis had suggested we separate.

"Why not?" I asked now, but cautiously.

He took a drink.

"Dennis?" I didn't like the things I was thinking or feeling. I had argued against a separation that last time, just as I had other times before that, but he looked more self-assured now.

The doorbell rang.

My eyes flew behind me to the door, then back to Dennis. "Who is it?" I asked when he showed no surprise.

He gestured with the glass for me to open the door, which I quickly did. A pleasant-looking, casually dressed, middle-aged man stood there.

"Claire Raphael?"

"Yes."

He handed me an ordinary business envelope. No sooner had I taken it when he turned and started back down the walk.

The envelope had my name on the front. The return address read the Office of the Constable of Essex County.

I closed the door. With an uneasy glance at Dennis, I opened the envelope. two.

The heading proclaimed the paper a Temporary Order issued by the Probate and Family Court Department of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Essex Division. Dennis's name was typed in as the plaintiff, my name as the defendant.