An Elm Creek Quilts Sampler (10 page)

“Figures.” Her mother stood up. “I guess that’s what you hoped to hear, right, Mother?”

“It isn’t a contest.”

“Easy for you to say. You won.” Her mother took the quilt and stuffed it back into the box. “Sarah will take good care of it, won’t you, Sarah?” She carried the box away without another word.

Grandmother held out her arms then, and Sarah climbed into her lap. She squeezed her eyes shut against the tears, but they fell anyway.

Even now, so many years later, resentment washed over her. She pushed the memory away. “My grandmother made me a Sawtooth Star quilt when I turned eight.”

“Is that so?”

“Uh huh.” Sarah stared at the quilt block. “I wasn’t allowed to use it, though. My mother said it was too fancy for every day, so she kept it in a box in her closet. I was only allowed to use it when Grandmother came to visit.”

“I see.” Mrs. Compson gave her a knowing look. “So your mother was the fussy type, with plastic on the furniture and all that, hmm?”

“No.” Sarah moved two of the block pieces closer together and studied them. “She wasn’t like that about anything except this quilt.” She wondered where it was now. Still on the floor of her mother’s closet, probably. “I had forgotten all about it. Funny, isn’t it, that out of all of those blocks you showed me, I would pick this one?”

“Not necessarily. Perhaps you chose this block because some part of you never forgot your grandmother’s quilt and never stopped missing it.”

“Do you think so?”

“Or perhaps the gift wasn’t a Sawtooth Star quilt but a Dove in the Window or a Sunbonnet Sue. Or maybe it wasn’t a quilt at all, but a doll or a pretty dress. Memory can be a tricky thing sometimes.”

The thought made Sarah uneasy. “So you think I’m remembering something that never happened?” That didn’t make sense. She could picture herself holding that quilt, running her hand over its softness and delighting in the bright colors.

“Certainly not. Something happened, some conflict with your mother, some tension between her and her own mother. But whether it was over a Sawtooth Star quilt or something else entirely, I couldn’t say.”

Sarah frowned. Mrs. Compson’s explanation was no comfort. She rearranged some of the block pieces and glowered at them. “These corners—they don’t match up right.”

Mrs. Compson tapped her wrist. “Stop fiddling with the pieces. You’re forgetting about the seam allowances again. Once the pieces are sewn together, everything will match up just fine and you’ll see how pretty the block will be.” She opened a small tin container full of pins. “Now you’ll learn how to hand piece.”

Sarah knew how to sew on a button but nothing more complicated than that, so she listened carefully as Mrs. Compson explained what to do. Following Mrs. Compson’s directions, she picked up a cream triangle and a blue triangle, placed the right sides facing each other, and pinned them together along the sewing line. Then she took the threaded needle Mrs. Compson handed her, tied a small knot at the end of the thread, and sewed a running stitch from the beginning to the end of the line, removing the pins as she came to them. After tying a second knot and trimming the extra thread, she creased the seam flat with a fingernail.

“Now, if you do that several thousand times, you’ll have a quilt top,” Mrs. Compson remarked.

Sarah continued to work, with Mrs. Compson looking over her shoulder and giving advice. When Sarah had finished all the straight seams and had joined several units into rows, Mrs. Compson explained how to sew through seams when joining rows together. Although Sarah’s piecing became faster and more accurate with every seam, Matt arrived before she was able to finish the block. She put the pieces and her sewing tools into her backpack so that she could continue sewing at home.

The rain had stopped, and the usual heat and humidity had returned. On the drive home, Sarah told Matt the little Mrs. Compson had revealed about her family and the history of Elm Creek Manor.

“I wonder what went on here to ruin everything,” Matt said when she finished.

“Me, too. For a moment I thought she was about to tell me, but just when she opened up, she got all upset and left. I can’t figure it out. From what she said, they had everything. Literally. A family, a home, enough money to take care of everything. Why would someone want to leave all that?”

“You’re asking the wrong guy.”

Sarah barely heard him. “I wonder,” she mused. “Claudia or someone must have done something terribly wrong to Mrs. Compson for her to break off all ties with her family.”

“Sometimes people break off all ties even when the family does everything right.”

Sarah started in realization. “Matt, honey, I didn’t mean—”

“Can we drop it, please?”

“But I didn’t mean that your mother left because you—”

“I said, can we drop it?”

Sarah watched him as he stared grimly out at the road in front of them. A long moment passed in silence.

“Matt?”

“What.”

“Mrs. Compson came back to Elm Creek Manor. You never know, maybe—”

“No, I do know. If my mother was coming back, she would have done it a long time ago. Don’t treat me like I’m five, okay?”

Stung, Sarah sat back in her seat and stared out the window. When they reached their duplex she jumped out of the truck and ran inside. She hurried upstairs and took a long shower, rinsing her stinging eyes again and again. She finished reluctantly and lingered in the steam, not knowing how to avoid her husband in such a small home.

When she finally pulled on her robe and went to the bedroom, Matt was sitting cross-legged on the bed, looking miserable.

Sarah tried to ignore him as she put on a T-shirt and cotton shorts.

“Sweetheart, I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

Sarah didn’t answer. She found some socks in her drawer and sat down on the bed to pull them on.

“Sarah, I’m really sorry.”

“I didn’t mean anything,” she muttered, looking at the floor. “I was only trying to make you feel better.”

“I know.” He touched her gently on the shoulder.

“I always make things worse.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do. I don’t mean to, but I do. I always say the exact wrong thing at the worst possible time.”

“That has nothing to do with it. I just don’t like talking about my mother.”

“Okay.” Sarah thought for a moment. “But in the truck I wasn’t talking about your mother. I was talking about Mrs. Compson’s sister.”

“You were talking about people going away.”

“Oh, right.” Sarah turned to face him and gave him a small smile. “So let me make sure I have this straight. I shouldn’t talk about families, or people going away, or mothers—”

“We can talk about your mother if you want.”

“Please, no. Anything but that.” Sarah flopped onto her back on the bed and closed her eyes.

“You know, you really ought to give your mother a break.”

Sarah groaned and threw an arm over her face. “Please don’t start.” They’d had this discussion many times before, and neither one ever altered the other’s opinion. Ever since Sarah’s mother had started dating again, three months after Sarah’s father died, every conversation between Sarah and her mother had turned into an argument. Sarah’s solution was to avoid contact as much as possible, even though it was obvious how much this disappointed Matt. He probably thought that if not for Sarah’s attitude, they could all be one big happy family. If he only knew what Sarah’s mother said about him when he wasn’t there to hear.

Sarah sighed. “I won’t talk about your mother anymore tonight if you don’t talk about mine.”

Matt chuckled. “Okay. Deal.”

Sarah reached out for his hand and pulled him down beside her. She rested her head on his shoulder and breathed in his scent of grass and earth and sunlight.

Her family, Matt’s, Mrs. Compson’s—none had lasted. She searched her memory and concluded that she knew only a few families that weren’t obviously screwed up. And those few probably just hid it better.

She held Matt closer. He was her family now. They would make their own family, one that didn’t hurt.

Eight

A
s she worked in the library the next morning, Sarah tried to concentrate on reorganizing the bookshelves instead of worrying about her upcoming job interview with PennCellular. After sorting the last pile of books, papers, and loose pages, she carried the newspaper bundles downstairs. Later she and Matt could load them into the truck and leave them in the recycling bin near their duplex.

With most of the clutter removed, the library took on a more dignified air. Sarah looked around, satisfied with her work. If she and Matt ever bought a house, she would love to have a room just like this one, full of books, with comfortable sofas to curl up on and a cheery fire in the fireplace in the winter. Before they could buy a house, though, Sarah would have to have a job. A real job.

Sarah sighed and gave up. It was no use; every random thought led her back to the job interview no matter how hard she tried to keep busy. Working at Elm Creek Manor was fine for now, but she had to find something with a future. If only she had a relative or a friend of the family who could help her get her foot in the door somewhere. But she had no such connections, and it wasn’t likely that she’d make any in Middle of Nowhere, Pennsylvania.

At noon Sarah changed into her interview suit and went to the sewing room to tell Mrs. Compson she was about to leave. The older woman set her quilt aside and scrutinized Sarah’s outfit. “Stand up straight,” she admonished. “You want them to think you have confidence, don’t you? They won’t want to hire someone who slouches.”

Sarah wished all she had to worry about was her posture.

Matt dropped her off a good fifteen minutes early, which she thought was just about right: early enough to make a good impression but not so early that she seemed desperate. “Maybe you are desperate, but Brian Turnbull doesn’t need to know that,” Sarah muttered to her reflection as she pulled open the glass door.

A receptionist near the entrance greeted her and directed her to a small waiting room. Some of the men sitting there glanced up as she entered, then returned to their newspapers and magazines.

She took the last empty seat and tried to get a look at the other applicants without being too obvious. They were all men, which was odd enough in itself, but they were also in their late forties to mid-fifties, surely too experienced for the kind of work Sarah was qualified to do. They wore expensive and expertly made suits. Dismayed, Sarah fingered the hem of her off-the-rack suit jacket and felt her cheeks starting to burn. She could have sworn Turnbull had said the position was entry-level. This interview was going to be a nightmare.

The man in the next chair turned to her and smiled. “Are you here for the cost accounting interview?”

Sarah nodded. “Yes.”

“We all are.” The man shifted in his seat and rubbed his palms on his fine pinstriped slacks. The large rings on the fourth finger of each hand glistened as he gestured to the occupied chairs. “Look at all these folks, and the opening hasn’t even hit the papers yet.”

“I guess a lot of people want to work here.”

“A lot of people want to work, period.” He leaned back and rested his right ankle on his left knee. His hair and mustache were thick and dark, sprinkled heavily with gray throughout. “Did you just graduate from college?”

Sarah smiled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. Actually, it’s been a while.”

“Oh. You look younger.” He let out a heavy sigh. “An accounting major?”

“That’s right.”

“There sure are a lot of you out there, aren’t there?”

Sarah looked him squarely in the eye. “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

“Nothing. I don’t mean anything.” His smile appeared forced. “Just … there seem to be more accounting majors every year.”

Sarah shrugged, wishing she could find a polite way to get out of the conversation. “I guess so. It’s an interesting field, I guess, and it’s a pretty stable career choice—”

“Stable?” a stocky man seated across from them interrupted. “Haven’t you ever heard of downsizing?”

“Bill, is that necessary?” the dark-haired man asked. He turned back to Sarah. “Don’t mind him. He gets cranky if he has to go five minutes without a cigarette.”

The stocky man glowered and raised his newspaper to block their view of him.

“Sounds like you know him,” Sarah murmured.

“We worked a temp job together during tax season. Bill smokes like a chimney, all right. I quit six months ago, myself. Did you know that corporate insurance rates are higher for smokers than for nonsmokers?”

Sarah shook her head.

“Well, it’s true. That’s why I quit. Why hire a smoker when you can save money by hiring a nonsmoker?”

“Can they really do that? Isn’t that discrimination?”

“Strictly speaking, they probably aren’t allowed to, but they can always find some other excuse to write down. ‘You’re overqualified.’ Or ‘The new owners like to hire their own teams.’ Some such nonsense.” He sighed. “The point is, why risk it?”

“I see what you mean.”

“I worked for the largest corporate insurance company in Pittsburgh for twenty years, and I know what I’m talking about.”

Everyone looked up as a tall woman in an elegant tailored dress appeared at the door. “Thomas Wilson?” she announced.

The dark-haired man picked up his leather briefcase and stood. “Nice talking with you. Good luck.” He extended his hand.

Sarah shook it. “Thanks. Good luck to you, too.” He followed the woman out of the room.

Her nervousness suddenly returned in full force. She selected a magazine from the pile on a nearby table and tried to concentrate on an article about HMOs. Occasionally the elegant woman would return and call out the name of another applicant, who would rise and follow her out of the room.

Finally, it was Sarah’s turn.

When they left the waiting room, the woman greeted Sarah with a firm handshake and a pleasant smile. “It’s good to meet you, Sarah. I’m Marcia Welsh, Director of Personnel.”

“It’s nice to meet you, too.” Sarah was surprised to hear that her voice sounded far more confident than she felt.