Chapter 10
WHEN THEY WERE YOUNGER, whenever the May sisters would fight, Nora would be the peacekeeper.
As teenagers, Emily and Julia seemed to disagree on just about everything.
Every movie they watched or pizza they ordered turned into an argument, until Nora would distract them by doing what she did best: being cute or funny.
Endearing. Once she got them both laughing, any unkind words or tense feelings were suddenly forgotten.
Her sisters pulled themselves apart; she pushed them back together. Again and again and again. Maybe Grandma Vera hadn’t been that far off when she’d called Nora the graham crackers.
But after Nora left Coronado early last year, she wasn’t quite sure how to fix things.
For maybe the first time in her life she was the cause of their fight, not the antidote, and that left her at a loss.
She considered calling Julia and apologizing, but when she ultimately didn’t get the part, it all felt like a waste, and she didn’t know how to justify that she’d left early.
Then, six months later, just like that, Nora finally got a break. An offer for a spot in the touring production of Beauty and the Beast!
Leo had a friend who knew about a sudden opening, and one quick, last-minute audition later, Nora suddenly found herself with the job.
She hadn’t spoken to either of her sisters in months, but suddenly, their fight evaporated from her mind.
Her sisters were the first people she wanted to tell her happy news to, and she quickly dialed them both in on a three-way call.
“Nora? Are you okay?” Julia’s voice was imbued with worry.
Emily didn’t say anything for a moment after saying hello, but Nora could hear her breathing through the line, which felt oddly reassuring.
“I’m good,” Nora said. “Actually, I’m great! Guess who just got cast in the national tour of Beauty and the Beast? Ahh!” She squealed, unable to contain her excitement.
“Wow!” Emily said, breaking her silence. “Nora, that’s really cool!”
“Oh my God!” Julia exclaimed. “That’s V’s favorite movie right now. When and where can we come see you?”
“I mean, it’s just a small part, in the ensemble. You don’t have to come,” Nora said. But she suddenly felt warm from her sisters’ words, from their belief in her. From the way they’d just cheered her on.
“There are no small parts. Only small actors,” Emily quipped. “Isn’t that what Grandma Vera used to tell us whenever she was rehearsing for auditions?”
Nora smiled at the memory. “Remember that one May when she worked a French word into every other sentence? Then she got that part, and she wrote me a letter telling me all about it. She only had ten lines in the whole show.”
Emily laughed. “That sounds about right.”
“Well, she was perfecting her craft,” Julia said. “Just like you’ve been doing all this time.” She paused for a moment and then she added, “Grandma Vera would be so proud of you, Nora.”
“She would be singing and dancing, jazz hands and all, by her firepit right now to celebrate,” Emily added.
Nora felt a sharp pang in her chest, and oh, how she wished Grandma Vera were still here. Why was it that her loss never really felt easier?
You did it, my tiny songbird! If she focused hard enough, she could almost hear the tinkling sound of Grandma Vera’s voice in her head.
“We’re all still going to Coronado… the last week in May, right?” Nora asked.
“Of course we’re going,” Julia said quickly. As if she didn’t remember she had threatened to have Nate book out their week. Then she added, “I shouldn’t have ever said we wouldn’t. We’ll go every year, no matter what. Right?”
“Right,” Emily agreed.
“Okay, good. Then I’ll request that week off from the show now,” Nora said.
“And email me the show’s schedule so I can see if I can find a weekend to take V,” Julia said.
“Yeah, and send it to me too. I also want to try and come,” Emily said.
And suddenly, all was right with the world, with the May sisters, and Nora’s heart felt full again.
At the end of April, when the show was in Detroit, Julia and Veronica and Emily flew in to watch the Saturday matinee, and Dad drove from Chicago.
They waited for her backstage afterward with flowers and hugs, and Veronica stared at her aunt in awe and asked if she could touch her dress.
“Of course!” Nora said, bending down and holding on to her niece’s tiny hand before gently pulling it across the green taffeta.
She had quickly gotten used to the rhythm of being on the road, the exhausted joy that put her soundly to sleep in a new hotel room after singing and dancing again and again, night after night.
But nothing had yet felt as special as this moment, when she’d managed to wow her two-and-a-half-year-old niece.
Veronica pulled back after a moment and clung shyly to Julia’s pant leg before asking Julia if she could whisper something in her ear. Julia bent down and listened to her daughter, pressing her lips together tightly, clearly trying not to laugh. “V wants to know if her aunt is a real princess now?”
“Last time I checked, Miss Ronnie,” Dad said, leaning his tall frame down to pat his granddaughter on the head, “no royal bloodlines on either side of the family. My girls got the big brains from me. And Nora, you got your voice from…” Dad’s voice trailed off, as if for a moment he wasn’t sure how to finish his sentence.
“Grandma Vera,” Emily chimed in. “Duh.”
“Right. I forgot that Vera could sing,” Dad said softly.
“Duh!” Veronica mimicked, and Julia shot Emily a look.
“What?” Emily shrugged. “There are much worse things I could’ve said. Be grateful.”
Julia rolled her eyes, and Nora half snorted a laugh.
Julia, Veronica, and Emily went straight to the airport after the show, but Dad asked if he could buy Nora a quick dinner before making the drive back to Chicago.
They went to a diner down the street from the theater, and Dad stared at Nora, looking pensive, after they both ordered. “What?” Nora finally said. “I can tell you want to say something, Daddy. Spit it out!”
“It’s just…” The waitress plunked down his black coffee and he took a slow sip before continuing. “I worry this is a hard life, Nora. Traveling day after day, week after week.”
“I love traveling,” Nora said emphatically.
He nodded. “You’re young now. But what about in ten years or twenty?” He took another sip of coffee. “Maybe after this tour ends, you go back to school. I can help you out with the tuition.”
Nora fought the urge to roll her eyes and wished she had ordered something stronger to drink than a Diet Coke, even though she had another show to do in two hours.
“This is just a stepping stone,” she said.
“After this tour ends, I’m hoping I can get a bigger role.
And then eventually something on Broadway.
In New York City. I won’t be traveling like this forever. ”
“Still,” Dad said. “An actor’s life is a hard life. And a degree never hurt anyone to have in their back pocket.”
Nora sighed. If he mentioned her back pocket one more goddamn time, she was actually going to lose it.
“Just think about it, all right?” he urged.
Nora finally promised she would, though even as she said the words out loud, she knew they were a lie.
On the last Sunday in May, Julia was the first to arrive at the Ocean Boulevard house.
She put her bag of marshmallows on the dining room table before changing into shorts and a sweatshirt and taking a long walk on the beach.
An hour later, Emily arrived and put her Hershey’s chocolate bars on the dining room table right next to the marshmallows, before going out back to take a nap on a lounger on the patio.
And thirty minutes after that, Nora walked in, clutching a box of graham crackers.
At six o’clock, they walked to the Brigantine for dinner, and at seven thirty they made their s’mores by the backyard firepit.
They all three stayed the entire week, strictly keeping to Julia’s meticulously prepared schedule. And not one of them mentioned their fight from the year before.