Chapter Mrs. Bennet #4
“You don’t want anyone tripping on your sidewalk,” Kevin said, smiling. He might be around her age, but she couldn’t tell for sure.
“No, I don’t.” She smiled back at Kevin.
“You’ve got a crack here,” Kiernan said. “This has caused the concrete plate to buckle.”
“Can you patch it?” Mary asked.
“It’s been patched before. If I were you, I’d fix it once and be done with it. We need to take up the sidewalk and repour the concrete; otherwise, we’ll be back in a matter of months to fix it again. We’re going to have a bad winter.”
“I didn’t know,” Mary said. “How much will this cost?”
Kevin ran his hand through his hair. “You’re just like my wife; you want to know the bad news up front.”
Mary tried not to show that she was bummed that Kevin was married, but she should have known. Every month it seemed that more single men in her age category drained away from the pool of potential husbands. Mary Bennet was on the verge of giving up altogether.
“It’s just an estimate,” Kiernan began.
“An estimate is fine.” Mary looked at him. “I won’t hold you to it.”
“We have to break up the old sidewalk, replane the ground, and pour the concrete. Looks like the curb is crumbling, so we need to redo it. We have to bring a cement mixer in. Five thousand.”
“Five thousand dollars?” Mary said the number out loud.
It wasn’t lost on Mary that she would be earning the exact amount in prize money that it would take to fix the sidewalk.
But when she called the city and reviewed the fines that awaited the Bennets if they did not fix the sidewalk, they were far worse.
Mary understood they would be saving money in the long run if they did the job once and properly.
Her father suggested a patch job, but Mary ignored him.
“Dad, we can’t wait on this. We’ve been kicking the can down the road for so long, we’ll never find it,” she told him.
Mary was tired of fixing things only to last long enough for them to go bust again.
The city of New York had a policy that the sidewalk and curb in front of a landlord-owned building was the responsibility of the homeowner.
Mary could not bear the thought of someone tripping and falling because of fissures and cracks in the sidewalk.
The Bennets could lose everything with one lawsuit. The reality weighed on Mary.
Mary put in her earbuds and listened to a podcast about the Bronte sisters as she washed the iron skillet and pans she’d used to make breakfast. She folded the dish towel and hung it on the hook when she felt the house shake. One jolt overhead.
She pulled the earbuds out of her ears and raced up the stairs. Her mother was screaming while her father lay on the floor next to the bed. Mary went to him. “Dad?”
He mumbled something, but Mary could not make it out over her mother’s hysterics. She dialed 911. She informed the operator of her father’s condition and their address. Mary turned to her mother.
“Not now, Ma. Enough with the drama,” Mary said to her mother. She knelt next to her father. “The ambulance is on the way. Don’t try to move, Dad.”
“Ugh,” Mr. Bennet moaned.
Mary looked over at the breakfast tray, untouched by her father and mother.
“I’m getting dressed.” Mrs. Bennet got up from the bed. “Do not try and stop me.”
DR. MARTINELLI
Mary handed her mother a cup of coffee. Mrs. Bennet wrapped her hands around the paper cup and sipped.
“Here’s a cookie,” Mary said, placing it on the table next to her in the waiting room. “In lieu of a proper breakfast.”
“Who can eat? Who can think about eating? This is the end,” Mrs. Bennet said as she stared off in the middle distance. She picked up the cookie and nibbled a corner of it. “Your poor father.”
“He’s not poor, and this isn’t the end.”
“The day I dreaded has come,” Mrs. Bennet said wearily, ignoring her.
“That would be every single day, Ma,” Mary countered.
“You wait. They’ll come at us with a terrible diagnosis.”
“His sugar was elevated. He may have crossed over from prediabetic to diabetic.”
“Or it’s cancer,” Mrs. Bennet whispered the C word and looked at Mary. “Better to expect the worst and work back.”
“Why?” Mary sat down next to her mother. “Why would anyone do that?”
“Because you can walk forward from bleak, but you can’t walk back from high expectations.”
“Ma, that’s ridiculous.”
“I don’t expect you to take anything I say seriously. You girls look at me like I’m Nathan Lane in The Birdcage or Aunt Pittypat in Gone with the Wind. I see your faces. You think I’m a hanky-waving wing nut. Emotionally unhinged.”
“Not true. I take most of what you say to heart—but this time, I just know you’re wrong.”
“I’m never right in your eyes.”
“That’s not true.” Mary was tired of arguing with her mother. “Are you afraid?”
Mrs. Bennet put the coffee cup down. She fished inside her blouse and pulled a handkerchief out from her bra strap, then dabbed her eyes.
“I’m terrified. I’ve been married to your father for half of my life.
More, maybe. I think it’s more. I was never good at math.
Anyway, this is where it’s all heading. Down the drain.
All that time expended and nothing to show for it. ”
“You have five daughters,” Mary reminded her.
“Who have left me for parts unknown.”
“I left you for parts upstairs,” Mary countered.
“You know what I mean,” Mrs. Bennet snapped.
“Come on, Mama. You know where your daughters are. They’re not far.”
“I suppose I shouldn’t complain. At least my Mary found it in her heart to stay.”
Mary sighed. When her mother spoke about her in the third person in her presence, Mary knew she was cooked.
She had no defense. Mary had stayed on Jane Street to care for her parents because she was needed, which in her mind was always the best reason to serve.
Second, HB Studios was close. Third, if Mary were offered the option to live anywhere of her choosing in the world, she would pick Greenwich Village every time.
How could she explain how much Jane Street meant to her?
The winding lanes from another century, with the lights in the high-rises twinkling in the distance?
The Hudson River, mighty and gray, with foam caps?
The Statue of Liberty, with her blue-green gown, holding a gold torch, that cut a beam in the night sky and could be seen for miles?
The wide expanse of the mouth of the Hudson, where it meets the Atlantic Ocean, where any explorer worth their salt had sailed through to find their idea of heaven?
Mary could go on and on about how much she loved New York City, but no one understood, not even her father and mother, who had lived in the city all of their married life.
“My Lizzie!” Mrs. Bennet shouted as her second-eldest daughter entered the room.
Lizzie Darcy wore cuffed jeans and a barn jacket. Her hair was pulled back in a low ponytail. Her cheeks were flushed bright pink, which brought out the blue in her eyes. “I came as soon as I could,” she apologized.
“I can’t believe you got here this fast,” Mary said.
“My angel!” Mrs. Bennet extended her arms like a three-year-old child who hoped to be lifted and twirled around the room.
Lizzie embraced her mother and sat down next to her. “Are you all right, Mama?”
“I’ll never be the same again.”
Lizzie looked at Mary.
“Dad will be okay. They ruled out his heart. And he didn’t have a stroke.”
“Thank goodness,” Lizzie said. “We should be grateful.”
“They have him doing tests right now. Could be diabetes,” Mary fretted. She knew if her father needed medication, she would be the one to administer it; her mother was incapable.
“He can live with that,” Lizzie said.
“Your father refuses to follow instructions and take the most basic of medications. I’d like to know how he could ever control his sugar.” Mrs. Bennet sighed.
“He will have to—that’s all. He will learn how to take care of himself,” Lizzie assured her. Elizabeth Bennet was the most practical of the Bennet sisters. She saw a way through any dilemma by using common sense. Lizzie created order from chaos.
Jane arrived. She scanned the room from the doorway.
Her sisters squealed when they saw her. Jane grinned and moved toward them, before her expression turned somber.
It was wonderful to see her sisters, but she wished it were just for fun.
Tall and willowy, Jane sashayed toward them.
Her heels did not click on the linoleum because she glided over the floor like a dancer.
She wore a wrap dress, and her chocolate-brown suede trench coat was open, the belt dangling from its loops.
Her suede pumps matched the coat. Her blond hair fell in waves to the top of her shoulders.
“There they are!” Kitty entered the room behind Jane and pointed.
“Oh, Kitty, were you working in the garage?” Mrs. Bennet made a face. Where Jane was chic, Kitty looked like a farmer fresh from the plow.
“I was pumpkin picking with the girls.” Kitty looked down at her muddy jeans and boots. Her hair was haphazardly pinned up with a series of small barrettes.
“Well, you make an excellent pumpkin picker,” Mrs. Bennet said. “Evidently, you had to dig for them.”
Mary, Lizzie, Kitty, and Jane looked at one another and laughed.
“I’m happy you find me amusing in my hour of despair,” Mrs. Bennet said, blowing her nose into her handkerchief.
Mary checked her phone. “Lydia won’t get here until the morning. She’s taking the train from DC.”
“Poor Lydia, living the peripatetic existence of an army wife. Do you think this country honors her sacrifice? I doubt it. She’s nothing but heart, my Lydia, and a cog in the wheel of American defense.”
“Her husband is a general. I don’t think they do cogs.”
“How many stars?” Mrs. Bennet asked.