“Thank you,” I said.
“Where’s Mr. Wever?”
“In the workroom. I was taking a break. Waiting for you.”
Lily glanced at the watch on her wrist. “We’ve got to be home in one hour. You’d better get back to work!”
“Just one hour? You sound like my Fairy Godmother. When the clock strikes four-thirty …”
Lily laughed. “I guess that makes you Cinderella.”
“Hardly.” I winked at her and downed the dregs of my coffee. “Grab your books. Max and I have cleared off a space for you to do your homework.”
“Homework?” Lily crinkled up her nose. “I want to help.”
“Homework first. That’s our routine at home and we have to stick to it.”
Lily pursed her lips like she was going to argue, but my warning look was enough to stop her protestations. She sighed and lifted a stack of textbooks from her bag, then followed me through the doorway into the spacious workroom.
At the sound of our footsteps, Max looked up from the table where he was hemming a pair of men’s pants out of pewter-colored wool. While Elena had slowly worked on her unique wedding dresses, over the years Max continued to create men’s suits that rivaled Armani. In fact, he had made such a name for himself that a chain of three specialty shops in New York, Chicago, and LA had commissioned him to create a custom line. Not only were Eden suits in great demand, they were a mark of prestige and good taste.
Something lodged in my throat at the sight of him bowed over the work that had earned this simple man a name in places he had never even thought to visit. His humility, his lack of pretension in spite of all he had accomplished amazed me. I swallowed, managed to say: “Max, I’d like you to meet my daughter, Lily.”
He straightened up slowly and readjusted the bifocals that had slid precariously close to the tip of his hooked nose. Though his stature and high, Dutch cheekbones made him seem intimidating, the moment Max smiled, the room was filled with warmth.
“So this is our girl,” he said softly. And then he came around the table and took Lily’s shoulders in his massive hands so he could study her sweet face.
I expected Lily to pull back, but instead she grinned at Max and gave him a quick, uncharacteristic hug around the middle. “Mom says you were kind of like her dad, so I guess that makes you kind of like my grandpa.”
Guilt stabbed through me at the implications of her words: It wasn’t fair that Lily had grown up without a grandfather in her life. But how could I have possibly remedied that? Cyrus’s dad died when Lily was only two, and I hadn’t spoken to my own father in years.
My father. Just the thought of him was enough to fill me with regret. Although our relationship had deteriorated by the time Cyrus entered my life, I was ashamed that I had allowed my husband to sever the final ties that held me to my dad. But what choice did I have? My father wasn’t the only one I lost when I married Cyrus Price.
“You already have a grandfather,” Max told Lily seriously. He gave me an indecipherable look. “Your grandpa was a hard worker and a good man. He always tried to provide for his family—”
“It’s complicated,” I interrupted briskly. Though I had spent my teenage years considering Max and Elena my family, they never let me forget that I had a father. A living, breathing dad of my own who just happened to be so caught up in his own life that he didn’t have any time to acknowledge the fact that he had a daughter. A living, breathing daughter who needed a daddy. “I haven’t seen my dad in years,” I said breezily, even though I almost choked on the words. I haven’t seen my dad in years … and it broke my heart in so many pieces I wondered if it would ever be whole again.
“That’s a terrible shame.” Max frowned. The reproach in his voice made me cringe.
If Lily noticed the tension in the room, it didn’t seem to faze her. “Well, Mr. Wever, it’s nice to meet you all the same.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” he said, turning back to her with a smile. “And I’d love to be one of your grandfathers. You can never have too many grandpas, can you?”
Lily shook her head, grinning at the bear of a man before her. “I just wish I would have known you when I was a kid.”
“You are a kid!” He laughed. “A peanut! A little goose.”
I fumbled for words as I watched Lily and Max. The sight of them together made me realize just how lonely I was. How isolated and bitter my life had become. It took my breath away to see my daughter so light and happy, to realize that she needed a man in her life—the sort of man that her father couldn’t be. “I’m sorry,” I finally said, anguished by all the years that we had lost. All the years that Max and Elena could have been a part of our lives. “I should have—”
“Nonsense,” Max broke in firmly. “Should is a terrible word.”
“But—”
“But nothing. Life is a journey, Rachel. As you walk along the road you can either look back or you can look ahead.” He stretched a single, crooked finger right past Lily’s nose, and pointed to some faraway future that I couldn’t begin to envision.
Lily squinted, following the line of Max’s finger as if she couldn’t wait to see what was in store. “Look ahead?” she guessed.
“You’ve got it, honey.” Max gave her a wide smile. “Always look for the very next step.”
Ten suits. Two months. Twenty thousand dollars. Those were the figures that Max presented to me when he called. I was so taken by the sound of his voice after all the years between us that I was rendered speechless—though he probably assumed I was experiencing sticker shock at the current price tag of just one of his suits.
“I hate to ask you, Rachel,” Max had all but whispered. Cyrus was gone for the day, but there was a certain hushed quality to our conversation all the same. “It’s just that it’s too late to back out of this contract. I’ve already made the shipments to LA and Chicago, but the New York store is expecting my completed order by Christmas.”
Hearing Max speak was like rewinding the clock, going back to a time in my life when things were simpler. Safer. I closed my eyes and listened to the sound of his breathing on the telephone line, and forgot to respond at all.
“It usually takes me two weeks to finish a suit. I’ll never get them done on my own,” Max continued. Then, softer: “Her heart attack was so unexpected. How could we have known? Elena was always so healthy. But now …” he trailed off. “What am I going to do, Rachel?”
“I’ll help you,” I said. Instantly I regretted it. How could I help him? Cyrus would never let me. But just as quickly as I rejected the idea, I embraced it again. “I’ll help you,” I forced myself to repeat. “At least, I’ll try. If I can find a way to come, I’ll be at your shop on Monday.”
“Thank you,” Max said.
“Don’t thank me yet. I haven’t promised anything. Besides, I haven’t touched a needle in over a decade.”
“It’s like riding a bike,” he assured me, his words light with hope. “I still remember the first time you tried a stitch. You were a natural.”
But there was no way Max could remember the first time I picked up a sewing needle. He wasn’t there.
From the ages of seven to ten, I wore the same Easter dress three years in a row. It wasn’t that we were terribly poor, though we certainly weren’t rich. Instead, the reason I had to squeeze into the same dress for several years running was that Bev liked to spend her money on things she could consume. And even if she had offered to take me to the mall, I wouldn’t have gone with her for love or money. I couldn’t stand the thought of anyone seeing me with her as she stumbled through the aisles at JC Penney.
Fortunately, it was a pretty dress. Blue, like my eyes, with a drop waist and a row of faux mother-of-pearl buttons that ran a dainty line from the top of the skirt all the way up to a lace collar. When I slid it over my head on Easter morning for the third time, I wasn’t so much ashamed of the dress as I was ashamed of the way that it pulled tight across my shoulders and skimmed the top
s of my knees instead of falling to my calves like it was supposed to. At ten years old, I was no fashionista, but I could tell when something didn’t look right. And staring at myself in the mirror, I knew that I didn’t look right.
Bev called me all manner of hurtful things from buck-toothed to stupid to an accident. But the name that stung the most was ugly, and as I considered the way I was squeezed into a too-tight, outdated dress I believed that what my mother said was true. I was ugly.
I had learned long ago that crying didn’t do me a lick of good, but I couldn’t stop the hot tears that pricked at the corners of my eyes. Dad expected me to wear a dress to church, or I would have simply given up the blue dress for a pair of pants and a nice top, but he was strict about some things and Easter Sunday attire was one of them. He was waiting for me downstairs, probably checking his watch to make sure I wouldn’t make him late.
Wiping at my eyes, I gritted my teeth and told myself that I didn’t care what anyone thought of me. I didn’t care that they knew my mother was a drunk, or that they called me Orphan Annie behind my back. My red hair and shabby clothes made me an easy target, but I decided I wouldn’t give anyone the satisfaction of knowing that their teasing got to me. I took a deep breath and tried to ease an extra inch out of the fabric by giving the dress a good hard tug—and sent a handful of the ivory buttons flying in every direction.
Dad found me scrambling across my bedroom floor, trying to rescue buttons from their hiding places in dark corners and underneath the bed.
“What are you doing?” he asked, leaning in the doorway. He took up the entire space, his broad shoulders nearly touching the doorjamb on either side. Dad wasn’t yet wearing his suit coat, and the defined muscles in his arms pressed against the fabric of his dress shirt.
“Nothing,” I muttered, biting back tears.
“We have to get to church, Rach. We’re going to be late.”
“I know!” I half-shouted, turning to him from where I crouched on the floor. I had the top of my dress clutched in one hand, my fingers holding together the places where the missing buttons gaped to reveal my cotton slip.
“What in the world are you doing?” He took a step into the room, his brow furrowed in confusion or anger, I couldn’t tell.
“I tore my dress,” I said into my chest. “I have to wear pants this morning.”
Dad loomed over me, his shadow blocking the glow from the ceiling light. “What do you mean you tore your dress?”
I offered up a handful of buttons, and Dad used the opportunity to pull me to my feet. He lifted me up as if I weighed nothing at all. “Some of the buttons popped off,” I said. “The dress is too small.”
“Nonsense.” Dad put his finger under my chin and tipped my face so I was looking at him. If he noticed the tears in my eyes, he didn’t say anything. “This dress fits you just fine. We just need to sew the buttons back on.”
“No, Dad. Please. Just let me wear pants.”
“On Easter? I don’t think so, Rachel. Your mother is even coming to church this morning. I want us all there together in our Sunday best. Maybe we’ll even take a family picture.”
I groaned. “Please, Dad. Just let me—”
“No.” His tone left no room for discussion. “I want you to wear the dress.”
I meekly slid off the ruined dress and accepted the bathrobe he offered me. Then Dad dragged me along as he went to hunt down an emergency sewing kit. We both knew that Bev would have no idea how to use it, so when we finally located the small, folded bundle at the back of the medicine cabinet Dad threaded the needle and handed it to me.
“I don’t know how to sew a button on,” I said, holding the slip of steel between my fingers gingerly.
He looked stunned for a moment. “You don’t?”
“No.”
“It can’t be that hard.” Dad glanced at his watch and gave me a pointed look. “We need to leave in less than ten minutes. Your mother is just finishing up her makeup.”
Bev could spend the better part of an hour finishing up her makeup, but Dad was tapping his foot as if to remind me that the clock was ticking down. So, since I didn’t know what else to do, I took hold of the fabric and stabbed the needle through the spot where the first button had left behind a frayed tail of white thread. It wasn’t easy, but I looped the needle through the hole in the back of the tiny button and sunk it into the fabric again. I made four passes before the sharp point missed the intended target and pricked the tip of my index finger.
It didn’t hurt that much, but I burst into tears all the same. “Please, Dad,” I begged, my voice cracking. “Just let me wear pants!”
He took the dress from me and reached for my injured hand, but I had already stuck my finger in my mouth and I refused to let him look at it. “The blue matches your eyes,” he said almost absently, fingering the cloth. And then he plucked the needle where it dangled from the end of a long thread and began to sew the button on himself.
I stood there, crying silently, and watched him sew every one of those six severed buttons back onto a dress that was two sizes too small. His fingers were thick and clumsy, and he swore under his breath once or twice, but he eventually finished the job. When he presented me with that horrible blue dress, it was wrinkled from the sweat of his calloused hands and discolored in spots. It looked like a used rag to me. Worst of all, what had once been a neat row of pretty buttons was now limp and uneven. The buttons sagged in some places and were stitched too tight to the cheap cloth in others.
Dad didn’t seem to get it. He didn’t even realize that his handiwork fell horribly short. “I’ll go find your mother,” he said. “If you get dressed quickly, we can make it before anyone notices we’re late.”
I put on the dress, but as I carefully slipped each crooked button through its hole, I decided that my father didn’t understand me. It felt like he didn’t even try. And that stung more than the wicked whispers of the girls who made fun of my dress.
CHAPTER 3
MITCH
December 24, 8:00 A.M.
The dining room of The Heritage Home is brightly lit and filled with people. But in spite of the crowd and the appearance of bustle, it is unusually peaceful. Clusters of elderly men and women huddle at an assortment of mismatched tables, whispering to each other as if age has simply erased the need to be loud. There is a small pot with a red poinsettia in the center of every table, and Christmas music hovers over everything like a mist. Best of all, the scent of griddle-hot butter and warm syrup fills the air. Pancakes? Mitch wonders. He loves pancakes.
It is not an unhappy place, but Mitch pauses in the doorway of the large room for a moment and glances around timidly. The tables are arranged with space for wheelchairs and walkers to manuever between them, and Mitch is filled with a quick gratitude that he can still walk on his own two feet. But he doesn’t know where to go. There are no place markers on the tables that he can see, and no one looks familiar. He swallows down a wave of loneliness and tries to resist the urge to go back to the strange room that suddenly feels like home. However, just as he is about to tell the nurse’s aide he’s not in the mood for breakfast, he catches a glimpse of a man aross the room.
He is tall and narrow, almost elegant, and something about the steady way that he carries himself makes him look like he doesn’t belong in an old folks’ home. Mitch watches as the composed man carefully lowers himself into one of four chairs at an empty table. Then the gentleman reaches a tapered hand for the linen napkin before him and unfurls it in one graceful snap. The fabric drifts lightly to his lap, and the old man watches it as if the secrets of the universe are written on the starched folds. He closes his eyes. Sighs.
“I want to sit there,” Mitch says, pointing to the man.
“It’s not your usual table,” the nurse’s aide chirps. She has a grip on his elbow and Mitch wiggles his arm loose with an attempt at a grouchy snort. “Whatever you’d like, Mr. Clark,” she amends, and though she should look chastened, Mitch
is disappointed to see that the young lady is only amused. He decides he must work on his grumpy old man routine.
“I can seat myself,” Mitch says, and he takes off without a backward glance. He crosses the dining room with what he would like to believe is a certain contemptuous dignity.
When he arrives at the small, round table, the unfamiliar gentleman is still gazing at his lap. “Is this seat taken?” Mitch asks, putting his hand on the back of the chair across from the stranger.
“Are we friends today, Mitch?” The man looks up and fixes Mitch with a gentle half-smile.
“Excuse me?” Mitch can’t help staring. He tries unsuccessfully to place the man’s bright blue eyes, his strong chin. “Do I know you?”
The man shakes his head, adjusts his smile. “I’ve seen you around,” he says vaguely. “My name is Cooper.”
“Nice to meet you,” Mitch says, but all at once he wonders if they’ve met somewhere before. “Care if I join you?”
“Certainly not,” Cooper says.
There is a long moment of silence as Mitch settles into his seat. He puts his napkin on his lap, trying to mimic the flourish with which Cooper performed the same action. But Mitch’s hands are clumsy; he feels like he is all thumbs. In the end he leaves the linen balled up and reaches for the utensils that frame his place setting. He is stunned to find that there are four pieces of indecipherable silverware. He glares at them, trying to focus, to make the gleaming silver make sense, but he doesn’t know what they are for.
“You won’t need your spoon this morning,” Cooper says kindly, picking up the utensil with the shallow bowl. “Not unless you want your pancakes pureed.” He leans forward and peers closely at Mitch. “Nope. Looks like you’ve still got your teeth.”
Mitch doesn’t quite know how to take Cooper’s teasing, but he picks up his spoon and sets it off to the side.
“And I don’t know why they give us two forks. It’s not like they’ll be serving salad with breakfast.” Cooper lifts the smaller fork and adds it to his discard pile. “There. All you need is a fork and a knife.”