Chapter 9
It was a total surprise to hear that Alana was headed back to New York City so soon. Greta read the text message on the back porch and immediately called her to see what was up. “Sarah is having a hard time,” Alana explained. “I’m going to go check on her.”
“A hard time?” Greta asked.
Alana sighed. “It’s her first time away from home. I think she’s freaking out.”
Greta leaned back in her chair and felt the last rays of the dying sun across her cheeks. She considered the fact that Ginny still hadn’t returned her phone calls that week. Maybe Alana would tease Ginny out of whatever hideaway she was in. Maybe that way, Greta could get information out of her.
“Can I come with you?” Greta asked.
“Really?” Alana sounded doubtful. It was true that Greta and Alana didn’t see one another one-on-one this often. Greta more often met with Julia one-on-one, as she was her literary daughter and more apt to have a dialogue about books and writing.
“I love being back in the city,” Greta said. “And wouldn’t you like the company? It’s a long drive.”
Greta waited for Alana on the front porch the next morning with her suitcase tucked beside her. Alana appeared around the corner seven minutes later than she’d said, and Greta hurried to throw her suitcase in the back and clamber in. Alana looked frantic. “Jeremy is just so worried about Sarah. I want to handle everything so he doesn’t have to take work off. But she’s his baby. His only.”
Greta took a deep breath. It surprised her to see Alana aching with empathy and fear like this. It was clear she loved Jeremy deep in her bones.
It wasn’t till they boarded the ferry that Alana asked, “So, Mom. Why did you really want to come to New York?”
Greta raised her eyebrows. “Why do you ask it like that? As though my motivations are sinister?”
Alana sipped a cup of coffee and raised her shoulders. “Not sinister. I just know you’re trying to learn more about this Celeste woman. Did you discover something? Something that’s pulling you back?”
Greta sighed and shook her head. “Ginny never got back to me. I want to go through the library archives. They have a theater division. I’m hopeful they have information about the Winsome Company and what happened to the people involved in their latter productions.”
Alana brightened. “I’m heading to rehearsal as soon as we get there. I’ll ask Ginny if she can meet for dinner tonight. I’m sure she’s just been too busy to call you back. Sarah says rehearsals have been grueling.”
Greta bit her lip. “I hope it isn’t too much trouble?”
“Ginny loves showing off the restaurants and bars she knows and loves,” Alana reminded her. “Even if she doesn’t have any information to share, I’m sure we’ll have a great night together. And it’ll be good to take Sarah out and make sure she’s well-fed and happy. It’s been just a week in the big city, but I’m sure it’s felt like a thousand years.”
Greta remembered when she’d first reached Paris as a young woman. She’d felt far away from anything she knew or understood; her thoughts were incoherent; she’d spent the third afternoon holed up in her room, sobbing. Little did she know that Bernard was waiting just a few streets away. Little did she know she’d walked into her future.
The drive to the city breezed by. Alana and Greta talked about easy things like swapping memories from a time of goodness and joy in the Copperfield clan. Sometimes, Greta wondered why she and Alana had never gotten along. This gorgeous woman was charming! A dream! Greta probed her own memories to try to make sense of it but came up dry. Families were inexplicable.
Alana dropped Greta off at the public library near Central Park. “I’ll send you details about dinner,” she promised before adding, “I love you. Good luck!” She whipped back into traffic and was surrounded by a wide variety of horns. Greta smiled, turned, and walked up the library steps. The library was guarded on either side by massive stone lions. It gave the experience a regal feeling. She wasn’t in Nantucket anymore.
A woman in spectacles at the front desk guided Greta to the theater department’s archives. “The city has hosted more than one hundred theater companies over the past forty years,” she said as they walked down the stairs. “But we’ve kept a record of just about all of them. Theater people tend to want to document things like that. They help.”
Greta thanked the woman and stood at an enormous filing cabinet filled with records and documents regarding theater production companies from the years 1977 to 2024. She flipped through several ones she knew for a fact had produced her plays—during the eighties and early nineties, mostly, and reminisced about coming to the city with Bernard to see the productions. She’d held her breath throughout each play. She hadn’t been able to believe that people had put so much work into the strange things that poured out of her brain.
Before long, she returned to her Celeste Harding quest and pulled out documents regarding the final years of Winsome Theater Company. Because they’d disbanded in 2008, there were plenty of photographs that offered a direct view of what it had been like to be a part of the troupe. Celeste was in the middle of several, smiling prettily, carrying scripts around. According to one of the files, Celeste had written eight plays for the troupe and directed four of them herself. Greta’s heart swelled with pride.
Greta thought back to the summer of 2003. Celeste and Greta spent several weeks writing a script. Celeste came up with a few plot points, and Greta adjusted them slightly until they had a wonderful plot. After that, they wrote by speaking lines in the air on the back porch of The Copperfield House. These were happy times for Greta. She burned with creativity all the time and frequently woke up in the middle of the night to record what she’d been thinking. It was impossible how quickly the two of them had written that script. But when it was over, they spent a beautiful afternoon splitting the parts and acting it out. Celeste had tears in her eyes as it finished. “This is really something special, isn’t it?” Greta hadn’t known if Celeste meant the play or their time together at The Copperfield House. She’d burst into tears, too.
That was the same day Celeste told her about growing up in her parents’ house. Her father had been a drunk; her mother had often left and come back again. They’d fought almost constantly when they were together.
It was then that Greta realized that she was Celeste”s mother figure. Greta never left Celeste. She never left The Copperfield House. She offered a beautiful and stable environment for Celeste’s creativity to grow and prosper.
“You’re going to be something special, Celeste Harding,” Greta had promised her. “I can just feel it.”
Alana texted to meet her, Ginny, and Sarah at a French restaurant on the Upper West Side. Greta wandered through the greenest Central Park she’d ever seen, watching baseball games and eating an ice cream cone until it was time to meet. Greta got to the restaurant before the three of them but said simply the name “Ginny” and was led to the perfect outdoor table. Alana, Ginny, and Sarah floated toward her soon after that like a dream.
Ginny extended her arms to hug Greta before the others. “I’m so sorry, Greta! I keep meaning to call you back. We’ve been positively overwhelmed with rehearsals. This play needs a lot of work. I’m not speaking of Sarah when I say that. The director hired a few actors that I probably wouldn’t have. Raw talent, for sure—but untrained!” She shook her head as she sat across from Greta.
Greta smiled at Sarah and looked for signs of distress on her face. But Sarah smiled confidently back.
“She was brilliant,” Alana answered before Greta had a chance to ask. “Absolutely stunning.”
“Whatever.” Sarah flipped her hair.
“Not whatever,” Ginny assured her. “You’ve got both raw talent and experience. You’re a force to be reckoned with. Pete…” She glanced at Greta to add, “Pete’s the director. Pete said he didn’t need to see anyone else for that role after you auditioned.”
Sarah melted on the spot and turned her eyes to the menu. She looked ravenous. Alana would tell Greta later that Sarah had spent all night weeping but woke up excited because she knew Alana was coming.
They ordered white wine for the table. Greta held herself back from jumping all over Ginny with questions about Celeste. When the waiter came with their wine glasses and a bottle, he poured it gingerly and talked about the regions of France from which the grapes were taken. Greta didn’t even listen. Finally, Ginny turned her eyes to Greta, bowed her head, and said, “I want to answer everything I can about Celeste. Ask whatever you want.”
Apparently, Alana had filled Ginny in a bit about Greta’s mission. Greta’s cheeks were warm. But she couldn’t stop now.
“I was just in the theater archives reading about the plays she wrote and directed for Winsome,” Greta said.
“She was sensational,” Ginny said. “It wasn’t that long ago, but women weren’t necessarily directors and playwrights as often. Things have changed like that.” She snapped her fingers and looked at Sarah as though trying to impress her.
“She must have been sad to see Winsome go,” Greta suggested.
“We all were,” Ginny said. “I didn’t get work immediately after that. I floundered, but I wasn’t the only one. But Celeste got work right away. I believe she was writing for a company called Handel. She was writing a brand-new play for them. It was all quite exciting.”
Greta furrowed her brow. Why did she feel devastation coming?
“I think she was nearly done with the play when everything changed for her,” Ginny went on.
“What happened?” Greta asked.
Ginny blinked with surprise. “I’m sorry. I thought you would have known that, too. Ginny’s mother came to the city in 2010. But it was short-lived. She died by suicide about two months after she moved here. It completely destroyed Ginny, obviously. She quit working on the play and took a leave of absence from the company. Somebody else slipped directly into the place she left behind.”
Greta gaped at Ginny. “That’s horrible.”
“Yeah. I was hanging out with her a lot right before her mom came,” Ginny went on. “She was really apprehensive about her mother moving here. Said that she’d always given her a lot of trouble. I don’t think she had a cozy upbringing. But the minute her mother arrived; Ginny seemed right as rain. She wanted to make up for lost time. One time, I even joined them for a picnic at Central Park. They were laughing and making up silly songs together. I felt like I had joined their secret club.”
Greta blinked away her tears. “Did Celeste tell you anything about why she might have taken her own life?”
“I didn’t see Celeste after that,” Ginny confessed. “The funeral was in Celeste’s hometown rather than in the city. She didn’t come back to the city for a while, and she stopped taking my calls. That was the same story for just about everyone.”
Greta filled her lungs and considered this beautiful and creative Celeste coming up in the world of theater. To lose your mother was a horrific thing. But to lose her by suicide added dimensions. There was always worry with suicide that you’d been the one to push them over the edge. Greta’s heart shattered around the edges.
“I guess that’s all I can really tell you,” Ginny said sadly. “I wish there was more.”
“Me too,” Greta offered.
“Maybe I can hook you up with a few other members of the troupe,” Ginny suggested. “Most of them have already left New York. They gave up.” She laughed softly. “But I have most everyone’s contact details.”
“That would be fantastic. Any information is worthwhile,” Greta said.
The waiter returned to take their order. Greta ordered her favorite French dish—chicken a la orange, which she’d made for a young Celeste numerous times. Celeste had scraped her plate clean and always asked for more. She’d been so alive.