Leaves (14 page)

“What gives?” he said.

Annie had no idea where to begin this conversation. “Let's just say I didn't have a big idea about five years ago, that I don't have an office in Vegas, and that I'm not ‘scouting locations.'”

Marty shrugged. “The grass is always greener, Annie.”

“Really? Does the grass on this side of the fence seem greener to you?”

Marty took another long sip of his tea and then stood. “I've gotta run. Are we still on for Thursday?”

“I'm on if you're on.”

“I'm on. Is – what was his name? – Joey coming with us?”

“Hell no. I've got a babysitter and a backup.”

Marty reached into his pocket for his car keys. “That's good. I'm kind of weird around kids.” He pecked Annie softly on the cheek. “See you in a couple of days.”

Annie got the impression that Marty didn't want her to follow him to the door, so she allowed him to let himself out. When she heard the door close, she brought his mug to the sink, noticing that he still had half a cup of tea in it. Replaying their conversation in her mind, she wondered if she'd driven him away with the manner in which she was talking about her life.

They still had their plans for Thursday, though. Annie would make sure to keep things a lot lighter then.

Maxwell was going to be late for the meeting. He'd been running behind the entire day. Things always got a little more frantic in the fall. It was make-or-break time for so many of the local businesses, even with the surprisingly strong summer.

He took his sports coat off the hanger behind his office door and then glanced at his overcoat. Did he really need it? The air was crisp this morning, but it looked like it had turned into a beautiful day. He'd take his chances.

“I'm heading off,” he said to Belinda, his assistant, as he passed her desk. Just then the phone rang. He knew he should just keep walking – he hated being late – but he'd never been able to ignore a ringing phone.

“There's someone named Lucretia on the line for you,” Belinda said.

“Lucretia, really?”

“That's what she says.”

He hadn't heard the name in years. “Lucretia” was what Maria called herself when she phoned him at college. She thought it sounded exotic and that his dorm mates would think he had a mysterious girlfriend. Maria spent a great deal of time telling him that he needed to be more three-dimensional back then.

“Lucretia” called often during his sophomore year. She was a senior at Quinnipiac and had started dating Doug seriously, and it seemed she had endless questions for her brother about the male psyche. From Maxwell's perspective, Doug was insanely and transparently in love with Maria, and that what was going on in his mind hardly needed to be analyzed, but maybe Maria just liked talking about him or maybe this was her way of staying in touch. Maxwell kind of liked it. Maria had never come to him for advice when they were home together.

After college, the use of the name “Lucretia” indicated that one of them required a heart-to-heart. If Maria called and introduced herself with a bad Eastern European accent, he knew they were going to be on the phone for a while. If something was troubling him, all he needed to do was ask if “Lucretia” was home to let his sister know that he had something on his mind.

It had been a while, though. Several years at least. What was going on with Maria?

Maxwell glanced at his watch. He was going to be ridiculously late now, but he had to take this call.

“Thanks, Belinda. I'll get it.”

He went back to his office, closed the door, and sat down at his desk. When he picked up the phone, though, there was no one on the other end. He hung up and dialed Maria's number.

“Did you just call?” he said when she answered several rings later.

“Call who?”

More than a little baffled, Maxwell simply said, “Never mind.”

Buying sheet music online had been a revelation for Maria. The last time she'd been able to concentrate on her playing, relatively few songs were available as individual music sheets and most songs came in compilations by artist or genre. This was fine when the artist was James Taylor or Joni Mitchell, but Maria had spent too much money and taken up too much shelf space on books that contained only one or two songs she wanted to play. Now, there was an enormous selection of charts she could buy singly, and even better, she could download her choices straight to her iPad. She'd bought a couple of Jason Mraz songs this morning, along with a few Amos Lee songs, and an old Eric Andersen, song, “Is It Really Love At All,” that she'd always wanted to learn.

She'd just begun to play the latter when the phone rang. Checking the caller ID, she was surprised to see her daughter's name. Olivia never called at this time of day, and Maria's first instinct was to worry.

“Olivia?”

The voice on the other end was bright, immediately easing Maria's concerns. “Hey, Mom.”

“Hey, Liv. Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, great. What're you doing?”

“Just playing some music.”

“Do you think you could peel yourself away for a little while?”

“Of course. Do you need me to do something for you?”

“I was kinda hoping you'd come pick me up at the train station.”

Maria pulled the phone back and looked at it, as though she could see Olivia's face through the receiver. “You're here?”

“The Amtrak just got in at Old Saybrook.”

“I'm getting in the car now.”

Maria was giddy with the idea of a surprise visit from her daughter. It wasn't until she was halfway to the station that she began to think that something could still be wrong. Olivia had a full course load on Wednesdays and she wasn't the kind of kid who blew off classes casually. Maria was nervous now, and the tension stayed with her for the rest of the drive.

Olivia seemed completely relaxed when Maria met her at the station, though, and her hug was warm, but not in the least needy.

“You look fabulous,” Maria said when she pulled back from their embrace.

“You always say that, Mom.”

“It's always true.”

Olivia hefted her backpack over her shoulder and went around to her side of the car. As they headed out of the parking lot, she said, “I'm starving. They had
nothing
good on the train.”

“Do you want to eat around here? If you can hold on a little longer, there's a great new Thai place in town.”

“Actually, what I really want is your mac and cheese.”

“Really?” This was a surprise. Olivia never passed up an opportunity to go out to eat. Admittedly, though, Maria made awesome mac and cheese. “We can definitely do that. It's going to take a little while, though.”

“That's okay. Are we stocked up on Wheat Thins?”

“We always are.”

“Then I'll have a few of those to tide me over.”

Olivia caught her up a bit on the ride home. As it turned out, Olivia's American lit and composition professors were both away at an event at Yale, and her European history professor was showing a documentary Olivia had seen in high school. Left with the makings of a wide-open day, Olivia had decided to make a quick trip home. She could catch the first train back in the morning and still make her Thursday classes.

An hour later, they were sitting down to Maria's lush macaroni and cheese, which Maria had laced with double-smoked slab bacon and yellow pear tomatoes. Olivia closed her eyes as she took her first bite, smiling contentedly.

“The mac and cheese at the dining hall is all wrong,” she said after she ate another forkful. “This, however, is as perfect as it always is, Mom.”

She's homesick
, Maria thought.
She's not going to admit it, but that's what's going on here.
The irony of this was not lost on Maria. A week earlier, missing her daughter, she'd decided to pay her a surprise visit and came away feeling horribly awkward, yet Olivia felt perfectly fine about surprising her when she was in need of a touch of home. Obviously, this was going to have to play out on Olivia's terms. Maria was okay with that.

Maria brought out a package of Mallomars after lunch and the two stayed at the kitchen table talking about classes, Olivia's roommates, the guy Brad, who no longer seemed to fascinate, and the news Olivia had gotten from her high school friends at other universities.

“You know how I've been playing the guitar again lately?” Maria said during a lull.

“Yeah, I want you to play me a few songs after I've had maybe
two
more Mallomars.”

“I ran into Martha McGarrigle the other day. She's been putting on shows at Mumford's and she told me she'd like me to play at the one the Thursday after next.”

Olivia clapped her hands together. “Really?”

“I don't think I'm going to do it, though.”

Olivia scowled. “What do you mean?”

Maria looked away from her daughter. “I'm not great with crowds.”

“Oh, don't be ridiculous – you're doing it.”

Maria laughed. “You're making this decision for me.”

“Well, someone has to. Come on, Mom, how cool would it be for you to get up at Mumford's and blow people away with your music?”

“I'm not sure people get blown away by my music.”

Olivia stood up. “Nope, sorry, not the time for modesty. You're definitely doing this. You're also giving me permission to cut classes next Friday so I can be here for the show.”

Olivia was already planning to be down for the party, so coming a day earlier would be no big deal. “You really think I should do this?”

“Of course I think you should do it. More importantly,
you
think you should do this.”

“I'm not certain about that.”

“Not buying it, Mom. I can hear it in your voice. What does Dad think about it?”

“I haven't mentioned it yet.”

“Well, mention it. Because you're definitely doing this and he's gonna have to come home from work early that night to take us out to dinner first.” Olivia started walking toward the living room. “Come on, show me what you're thinking of playing.”

Maria followed her daughter out of the kitchen, feeling exponentially happier about this impromptu visit.

Deborah was putting her knives away and trying not to think about using them on her family. Corrina had called another Wednesday dinner. This meant Deborah had to cook on her day off, which really wasn't much of a hardship, except that it meant she couldn't cook for Sage (though he was coming by later). It also meant she had to endure more of her sister's histrionics about the party, and that was becoming increasingly difficult to do. At least Olivia was there, which was a nice surprise.

“Is the coast clear?”

Deborah looked up to see Sage grinning at her from the doorway. Her shoulders relaxed instantly. “Yes, they're finally gone.”

Sage moved toward Deborah and enveloped her. She sighed and melted into him. “Do you have your new marching orders?”

She tilted her head up to kiss him. “General Corrina has explained the errors of my ways and charged me with my mission.”

Sage nuzzled her neck. “I can't tell you how sorry I am to have missed this.”

As Sage kissed her jaw, Deborah wanted nothing else but to have this man caressing her. Memories of Monday afternoon made her knees a little wobbly. Unfortunately, he chose that moment to pull back and reach for her hand.

“Come tell me about it,” he said as he guided her toward a chair in the kitchen.

“Talk is overrated,” she said as she sat. “Can we go back to what you were doing with my neck?”

Sage's eyes made it clear that his memories of Monday were as pleasant as hers. “We will definitely go back to that. Talk to me first. You looked pretty tight when I walked in.”

Deborah felt herself slumping. “Oh, it's just the same garbage with some new garbage added. Corrina being autocratic, Maxwell being a politician, Tyler being befuddled – the usual. On top of that, Corrina and Tyler were sniping at each other even more than they have been. It was lots of fun. I made a pork loin with apples and currants and a brown butter pan gravy; I don't think anyone noticed, though they ate all of it.”

“It sounds like the party is getting the best of them.”

“I don't think that's it. I mean, it's some of it, but something tells me it would be this uncomfortable if it were June.” She looked away from Sage for a moment and considered that notion. “I can't imagine what a dinner
next
June will be like. I wonder if we'll even have one.”

“Your family has been close for a long time, right? Things will normalize.”

Deborah nodded her head slowly. “That's just the thing. I think this might be the new normal. What if all the tension is a symptom? What if now that my father and mother are gone – and soon the inn will be as well – we don't have any reason to stay connected?”

Sage took her hand and rubbed it softly. “I guess that's a real possibility.”

“You should have seen it tonight. Corrina and Tyler looked like they genuinely disliked each other. I mean, we've always taken shots and gotten under each other's skin, but this wasn't that. This was real pissed-off stuff.”

“And neither of them will tell you what's going on?”

“It's not open for discussion. If I ask one, all they do is complain about the other, but the complaints don't match the anger.”

Deborah drifted back to the last time she'd broached this with Tyler. What she'd found most disturbing about the conversation was his complacency. It was as though he was already well on his way to accepting that his sister would some day be an acquaintance.

Sage squeezed her hand and then brought it to his lips. “I'm afraid I'm not going to be much help analyzing family dynamics. I haven't seen my father since a couple of weeks after my mother's funeral, and I haven't spoken to my brother in three years.”

Deborah studied his eyes. “I think that might be me and my siblings soon.”

Sage moved closer. “Maybe not. You're different. I never liked my brother. He eats frozen bagels.”

That got a smile out of Deborah. “Frozen bagels? That's genetic, you know.”

Sage's eyes few open in mock surprise. “It is?”

“It is. You're fighting your destiny. All those truffles and elderflower honey aren't going to save you, though. It's only a matter of time before you start chowing down on canned spinach. Thanks for letting me know now. I'm glad I didn't get too committed.”

Sage laughed and then moved even closer. “
Too
committed?”

“Well, yeah. I was a little into you.”

“Really?”

Impulsively, Deborah took his face in both of her hands. “What part of purring contentedly next to you did you misunderstand on Monday?” she said softly.

He pulled her toward him and then drew her onto his lap. “Absolutely no part.”

He kissed her passionately, and the last vestige of tension over the family dinner vaporized. “Okay, maybe I'm more than a little into you.”