“Bye,” she’d say as she pecked Dan on the cheek, before rendez vousing with Lucie on the porch of their duplex. “Morning, Ginger. Morning, Luce.” The two women coordinated activities for the kids to minimize driving, and they even kept Rosie busy with just enough housework—folding laundry, emptying the dishwasher—that she felt she was contributing. They’d tried convincing her to relax after they’d initially moved in, but Rosie always tried to get up on step-ladders and dust the tops of the cabinets when no one was looking. Now they’d convinced her that Darwin did the dusting (which she did not) and wrote out a lightly scheduled to-do list for Rosie. Keeping her occupied proved to be a safer option.
There were other quirks about their lifestyle as well. Rosie had become self-conscious about napping when Lucie was home, but for some reason, she felt perfectly fine about resting her eyes on Darwin’s sofa. If it worked, it worked, and that’s what mattered, Darwin always reminded Lucie. After all, hadn’t that been the point when the two friends bought an attached house, with room for each family on either side of the joining wall? And Lucie was more than willing to take Cady and Stanton when Darwin wanted to work on a paper, or even to just let her get some sleep before a big presentation.
But they fed off each other’s worst traits as well, with Lucie obsessing that each Sunday, each holiday, could be her mother Rosie’s last. Even though her physical health was okay. And Darwin, even as she was exhausted, would chase Cady and Stanton around the house, recording and photographing every moment because she could barely remember one minute to the next. The sense of holding on tightly while it all rushed through their fingers loomed in their homes, and they rolled their eyes as much as Dan, overhearing them worry out an hour, shook his head and urged them just to enjoy life. It was difficult to relax when it was all going so fast. They could savor an experience only in the retelling.
Living so close, brainstorming together late into the night on plans for their TV channel Chicklet—in addition to their main jobs as professor and director—and trying to manage the needs of three kids and one forgetful senior was causing tensions to build. Each woman longed for a chance to be on her own. For at least fifteen uninterrupted minutes.
That very reason led Lucie to plan on attending Christmas at her brother’s and Darwin to agree to pack up Cady and Stanton and fly with them solo to visit her parents in Seattle. Dan would arrive a few days later, on Christmas Eve, having little vacation time, since he was the junior doctor in the practice. For good measure—and to maximize time with her grandchildren—Betty Chiu took pains to invite Dan’s mother, the formidable Mrs. Leung, for the holiday meal. Darwin’s sister, Maya, would also be at the house, sleeping on the pull-out couch in the basement as Dan, Darwin, Cady, and Stanton stuffed themselves into the two single beds that filled what was once Darwin and Maya’s shared childhood bedroom.
In spite of all of the inconvenience, Darwin looked forward to Christmas. She’d already begun packing, piling up diapers and plastic pants and toddler cardigans with matching hats made by Lucie, all stacked in neat, orderly piles on the sofa and the coffee table. She’d dragged down two huge suitcases, black and tattered, from the attic barely a day after Thanksgiving, placing them across the doorway to deny the twins entry into the space. Momentarily confused, the pair simply refocused their energies on pulling pots onto the kitchen floor. And Darwin simply pulled on a pair of noise-canceling headphones and continued what she was doing.
Thing was, she spent so much of her energy focusing on mile-stones that once she reached them, she simply looked past to what was coming next. She’d been that way when she struggled with infertility, desperate to share a baby with Dan, and then found herself horrified by the stress of new mommyhood. In the same manner, Darwin had been convinced that sharing a home with Lucie would solve her concerns for child care. Which it did. What made it tricky was that it brought up a host of new challenges, including the fact that they all lived basically on top of one another.
If this, then that: an equation that had summed up Darwin’s attitude many years ago. Now she knew there was no set way of parenting, of being married, of living a life. And for the first time since the kids were born, she wanted to slow down and really celebrate. Not just to tick off the twins’ second Christmas as another line on her to-do list of life, but to step outside of her day-to-day to truly absorb the memory. To recognize that she would have this holiday only this one time, and as such, she ought to make it count.
chapter six
Last year she was different. Next year she would change again. There was no standing still, no letting things sink in. The girl she was, the woman she would be: Dakota felt as though being able to sort out her emotions would make her options clearer somehow. That understanding the past would help her rate the future. But all she experienced was confusion when she tried to think logically about what was the wisest course of action. She felt as though she’d been kicked in the stomach when Peri told her she’d been approached with an offer. Then she felt angry. Then panicked. How would it impact school? Dakota already worked as much as she could. What should she do about the shop? If Peri took the job. Which she might not, right?
The one fact she knew for certain was that she wanted to sort it out alone. Without running to her father, or to Anita, or to Catherine.
She’d texted, asked for the meeting. Peri suggested Grand Central, making things convenient for Dakota—who was coming in on the Metro-North train from school in Hyde Park—and avoiding the yarn shop altogether.
Dakota sat on the train, surrounded, as usual, by her pack-mule accoutrement: a backpack of books, her purse and cell phone tucked inside, the knitting bag stuffed with that damn unfinished camel-and-turquoise sweater, as patient now as it had always been. Waiting to be finished. She closed her eyes, almost drifting to sleep with the rhythm of the train, and tried to sort her thoughts.
It was troubling how at the beginning of last year she was ready to walk away from the shop, and now she finally had come to a concept—with the knitting café—that would allow her to build on her mother’s legacy and fulfill her own goals as well. How finally everything was fitting. All that was required was Peri’s part-ownership and participation to keep things running as Dakota completed her studies and James found a way to redesign the building in between trying to keep his business afloat; the Walker and Daughter redesign was hardly his most lucrative venture.
She’d thought of the obvious solutions of finding new people. But it wasn’t as simple as replacing Peri with someone else. Walker and Daughter wasn’t just a store; it was a family. It felt as though Peri was abandoning the whole enterprise. The whole group! Just wait until they all found out; she could already imagine the outcry.
All this Dakota believed, and yet she wished the status quo could remain. Just a smidge longer. Just until she was ready.
But then, that had been the problem with the club’s plan all along. It had all been about Dakota.
Dakota marched up the stairs to the restaurant overlooking the lobby of Grand Central Terminal, surveying the painted stars overhead, the gleaming gold chandeliers, the hordes of shoppers and commuters scurrying across the grand hall as they arrived and departed.
“Hey, lady,” said Peri, waiting in a booth with a cup of tea. “Nice to see you outside of the store. When was the last time that happened?”
“Yeah,” said Dakota. “Too long.”
When Peri was twenty-four, she recalled, she’d disappointed her family by avoiding law school. Her plan had been to break into the designer-handbag industry, but instead she spent seven years of her life running a business that, although partially hers technically, was not exactly hers emotionally. Everyone thought of the shop as Georgia’s and Dakota as her chosen successor. What a terrible role for Peri, Dakota realized, looking at the slim, serene black woman she’d admired as a young girl (and could now call a friend as well as a colleague), to be expected to always be the regent, never the monarch. To always be in the wings.
Even the handbag business, which initially benefited from the exposure in the shop, was now growing more slowly than it might be because of Peri’s commitment to Walker and Daughter.
The balance was shifting.
“We’re hurting you,” Dakota said quietly. “Managing the store is holding you back.” Even as she said so, her stomach tied itself into knots, knowing that drastic changes would occur if Peri wasn’t there. What if they couldn’t find the right manager? What if business continued to slow down? What if she needed to literally buy Peri out with cash? What then? It didn’t seem right to expect other people—such as Anita, such as her father, such as Marty—to continually make Walker and Daughter their pet project financially. But after two redesigns in as many years, the shop was running with a tight cash flow.
“No, I’m doing fine,” said Peri. “So many designers don’t get the chances I’ve had. The shop means so much to me. And this was such a crazy idea.”
“Working with Lydia Jackson in Paris? You couldn’t get better exposure if you got your bags on Project Runway,” said Dakota, ordering a tuna burger and sweet-potato fries.
“But there is so much unknown,” said Peri, sipping from a cup of tea. “I’ve worked in a knit shop for almost a decade, and suddenly I’d be whisked away to Paris. What if it didn’t pan out? What about Roger? And what about you?”
Dakota knew that when Georgia Walker was twenty-four, she was pregnant and frightened, having abandoned a potential career in publishing to flee back to her parents. Her chance meeting with Anita resulted in an unexpected life as a knitting entrepreneur. And that’s all it was: an opportunity to which she said yes, even as it scared her. This was her mother’s great legacy, Dakota knew, more than the physical existence of the shop. Her great gift to her daughter. The ability to dare.
“You have to decide what’s best for you,” she said now. “Not me. Not the shop. Just Peri.”
“But I don’t know,” admitted Peri, her lips trembling just slightly. Like all the members of the club, she had spent many years trying to soothe Dakota’s loss of the only parent she’d known for much of her life. The result being that most business decisions were made based on what was in Dakota’s best interest. Not Peri’s. It was an unspoken requirement of all of the women, and an expectation that had made Peri feel resentful and generous by turns. And yet, in the instant she was offered the chance of a lifetime, the chance to walk away, she hesitated. Freshly aware that her connection to the shop—and to Dakota—was about much more than business. Something she’d forgotten too often.
“I was so mad at you,” said Dakota, laughing as she sampled her dinner.
“When I told you last week about the job offer?” Peri looked startled.
“I was referring to when you redesigned the shop,” said Dakota. “Didn’t want anything to be changed.”
“Oh, well, you were difficult,” agreed Peri. That redesign had been the result of an ultimatum.
“Yes,” said Dakota. “Peri, I was riding the train here, half thinking about a dough that wasn’t rising properly, and I just knew: This whole situation hasn’t been fair to you. It has to change.”
“I’m no victim.” Peri stood up straighter in her chair. “I have always had a choice in my life, whether I believed it or not. And I’ve made quite a success for myself.”
Dakota nodded.
“With help from friends, I know,” said Peri. “In that respect, we’re even.”
“No,” said Dakota firmly. “We’re not. You’ve thrown your soul into your career and made sacrifices to honor promises from long ago. How could you know what chances were coming? I’ve been given a huge gift: love and support and the space to grow up on my own terms. I’ve suffered, I’ve lost my mother, but I’ve never made sacrifices for anyone. I receive, but I rarely give.”
Peri frowned, troubled. Dakota had had many personalities as a teen—mainly petulant—but recently she’d become quieter and more focused than ever before. More, Peri had observed on more than one occasion, like her mother.
“Dakota, don’t you understand that I’ve decided?” said Peri. “It’s too much, weird timing, cold feet. I’m going to turn the job down. Nothing is going to change at Walker and Daughter.”
“Please don’t,” said Dakota. “Just think about it. Wait until the New Year. Then decide.”
“And what are you going to do with the shop if I’m not around?”
“I haven’t figured out that part yet,” Dakota acknowledged. “But I’m working on it.”
The weathercasters were calling for a blizzard, but the snow was just drifting down lightly as Dakota trudged from Grand Central to her father’s apartment. One down, one to go. She’d avoided her father lately, not wanting to tell him about her internship, not ready to let him know she was not going to go to Scotland. After speaking with Peri, she felt more certain than ever that work had to take priority. Maybe later she’d have a moment to slow down and take a trip. But here, in December, she had to be like her mother. She had to look after business. She had to develop her skills in order to reach her potential.
Dakota said all that and more to James, who sat impassively listening to her reasoning, the only clue to his feelings revealed in the manner in which he clenched his jaw tightly.
“I know it seems selfish, Dad,” she finished. “But it’s what I need to do for my future. This internship is beyond huge. Sometimes we have to make sacrifices.”
“Having an inch of self-awareness doesn’t make your decision any less selfish,” spat out James. “You are taking something away from me here. From your grandparents, your uncle, your great-grandmother. You talk about sacrifices, Dakota, about finally—what was your phrase?—‘understanding the power of decisions,’ and yet the main person you’re thinking about here is you. Only you.”
Dakota paced the living room of the apartment, weaving around the furniture that had been put away on Thanksgiving. “Sometimes you have to choose work over fun,” she said.
“I agree,” said James, his voice controlled. “But what a mistake you make when you choose work over family.”
Dakota looked up sharply, the smart retort on her tongue, before James interrupted her.
“It’s what I did, Dakota,” he said softly. “We all lived with the consequences. And it’s a regret that never goes away. There will be other internships, other restaurants, other opportunities. But there will only be this one Christmas, this one December, this one moment to enjoy these holidays with your family.” He’d half convinced himself that accepting that Dakota was now an adult would make his life easier, but all at once he understood that his power lessness would frustrate him always. If only she would believe he’d learned a thing or two!
“I can make my own decisions, Dad,” Dakota said, as calmly and quietly as her father. The two faced each other, both tense and uncertain.
“I know,” said James, leaning back in his chair and bringing his hand to his forehead. “But that doesn’t make them smart decisions. Or the right ones.”
chapter seven
The plane was delayed by weather. Catherine didn’t know what to do as the arrival time moved farther and farther away. At this rate, it would be tomorrow before they finally got here. Should she stay and wait for the Toscanos and for Sarah? Go home for a few hours? Throw out the box of bagels she’d brought with her as a welcome-to-New-York gift?
She was certain airport security was about to arrest her any minute for acting suspiciously, as she would make up her mind to leave and march to the automatic doors, wait for them to open, and stand there. Then she’d circle back to stare at the arrivals board, hoping to see something different. Sometimes she did: The flight was coming in even later than first suspected.
There was only one bar left on her phone’s battery indicator, too, having been depleted as she spent the better part of two hours calling everyone. The plane is late, she told Anita. And Dakota. And KC. And James. She called him, trying to soothe herself with some last-minute
tips.
“Of course you’re on the phone with me,” boomed James into his cell. “I’m known the world over for my successful romances. You know, how I walked out on the love of my life for over a decade. That’s my first tip: Don’t do that.”
“James, quit being an idiot,” hissed Catherine. “Marco and his kids are going to be here any hour now, and I’m a bit jumpy.”
“Just be yourself,” said James. “Isn’t that what they say?”
“No,” said Catherine. “The point is that I want to be better than myself. I want the children to fall in love with me.”
“You can’t replace their mother,” said James.
“I’m not trying to,” said Catherine. “But you said so yourself, you just waltzed back in and Dakota loved you anyway.”
“Pure luck,” said James, chuckling. “And okay, I bribed her. That’s no secret.”
“I told Marco only about half of what I’d bought for Allegra and Roberto, and he said I should return most of it,” said Catherine, her voice rising. “He said it would be too much.”
“Well, maybe you should listen,” said James. “I did annoy Georgia a lot by spoiling Dakota. Made her look chintzy in comparison.”
“So, what you’re telling me is . . . not really anything I can use?”
“Essentially, yes,” said James, his deep voice breaking into a laugh. “It’s all good, Catherine. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t care so much.”
“Speaking of caring, Dakota told me about her intention to skip Christmas,” said Catherine.
“Oh, yeah, that,” said James. “It’s awkward all around. I promised Georgia’s Gran that I’d bring her family to her, and she’s counting on it.”
“You’re not really going to go on your own, are you?”
“Have you met Georgia’s Gran?”
“I have, actually,” mused Catherine. “So I hear what you’re saying. As for Dakota . . .”