Chapter Eleven
“Watch that box, please! My computer’s in there.” Maureen followed the mover nervously, wincing as he banged the corner of the cardboard carton against the staircase railing.
“Sorry, ma’am.”
“Careful not to trip.” She trailed him up the stairs, trying to smooth out the canvas drop cloths placed over the main traffic areas.
The relentless back-and-forth between the van and house had bunched the sheets to the extent that Maureen was more worried about injuries and lawsuits than dirty prints on the newly installed carpet.
“Where did you say you wanted this?” he asked.
“Master bedroom.” There was an alcove by the big bay window, where she intended to set up her desk.
Taking on a limited amount of local legal work had been playing at the back of her mind for some time now.
It made sense, given that Holly was mostly in school, and her partnership in the heli-skiing business demanded so little.
Thank heavens. Because having to deal with Jake on a regular basis would probably have killed her. As it was, they hadn’t spoken in more than two weeks. May had become June. School would soon let out for the annual two-month break.
“On the desk here?”
“Yes. Fine.” Maureen sank onto the bare box spring and mattress and watched the man ease the cardboard box down on the scarred oak table, which had once belonged to her mother.
She’d made a lot of mistakes in her life, and now she included falling for Jake Hartman as one of the biggies. She squirmed every time she remembered crying in his arms, dumping out her most private secrets and insecurities.
With hindsight, she could view her behavior in only one way. Pathetic. Up until that point Jake had probably seen her the way others did: as a reasonably intelligent, confident and capable woman. Behind that facade, however, was a woefully inadequate wife and mother.
No wonder he’d felt compelled to back away from her.
“Are you okay, Maureen? You look flushed.” Kelly came breezing up the stairs, carrying a glass sculpture that Maureen had refused to allow the movers to touch. Carefully, she set it on one of the night tables, then pressed a hand to Maureen’s forehead.
“This move has been making you crazy. You need to slow down. Who cares if the unpacking takes an extra week or two? You and Holly have lots of time to settle, and Cathleen and I’ll help whenever we can.”
“I’m fine. Maybe I took the stairs too fast.” Maureen ran her hand gently over the sculpture.
It was a hand-blown abstract piece she’d picked up on a business trip to Helena several years ago.
She adjusted the angle at which it sat, so that it caught the light from the big bay window. That was better.
“Ma’am?” a voice hollered from the front door. “Where do you want the entertainment unit?”
“Living room, please.”
“I have a few of your houseplants in the car,” Kelly said. “Where should I put them?”
“On the kitchen floor for now.” Maureen followed her out of the room. In the hall she noticed Holly’s bedroom door was closed.
The previous owners had allowed them access a week early and Dylan had gone ahead and built a shelving until into her daughter’s room. Maureen gathered that Jake had helped, too, but when she’d asked, Dylan had been evasive.
Once the woodwork was completed, she’d had the room painted and had ordered new carpeting. She’d hoped Holly would get excited by the project, and had planned to give her daughter a free hand in the decorating, but Holly had been frustratingly resistant.
“I don’t want to move. Why can’t we stay at the B and B?”
“Because Dylan and Cathleen need the revenue from renting out our rooms. We’ve talked about this.”
“Can’t you afford their usual rate?”
“That isn’t the point.” She was a grown woman with a daughter. She needed her own place.
Now Maureen knocked on her daughter’s door. Hearing no answer, she twisted the knob and peeked inside. Holly was sitting on the floor next to a stack of cardboard boxes.
Annoyed that her daughter was hiding out while everyone else worked, she was about to make a sharp comment. Then she noticed the fine red dots at the corner of Holly’s right eye. Always a sign that she’d been crying.
With a real effort, she tried to see the day from her daughter’s vantage point.
Maybe staying at the B and B had given Holly the illusion that they were on an extended holiday.
Settling into this town house made their relocation from Missoula permanent.
And maybe Holly felt that she was being distanced from her memories of her father.
“Moving into a new place is strange, isn’t it?”
Holly said nothing.
“It’ll be different here,” Maureen acknowledged. “In the old place I could always picture your dad grabbing a snack at the fridge, or sitting on the couch by the TV. We won’t have that now.”
Holly pressed her lips together and her eyes flooded.
Maureen was reminded of the heartbreak she’d felt as a child when her father deserted the family. She dropped to the floor and curled her arms around her daughter. Holly didn’t lean into her, but she didn’t push away, either.
“Just because we moved doesn’t mean we’re going to forget about Dad, sweetie. We’ll put up all our family photos, and we’ve still got the videos, right?”
Holly hiccupped, swallowing a sob. Maureen rested her cheek on the top of Holly’s head and drank in the citrus scent of her daughter’s shampoo.
“I miss Daddy.” With Holly’s words, the pent-up tears burst out. “I miss him so much.”
This was the first time her daughter had shared her pain, and Maureen wanted desperately to offer some kind of advice. She tightened her hold and struggled to find the magical words that would help Holly.
But she came up with nothing.
“Of course you miss him,” was all she could say, before lapsing into a frustrated silence. She thought about the time Holly was in grade one and an older child had told her she was so short she would probably be a midget.
Holly hadn’t known what a midget was, but she’d recognized the meanness when she heard it.
Maureen hadn’t been able to ease the sting from that encounter, any more than she was able to deal with this. Why was she so hopelessly inadequate at helping her daughter weather life’s tougher challenges? Other mothers, she was quite certain, would have known instinctively the right thing to say.
*
Jake thought about flowers. He thought about wine. But in the end he decided something homemade would be better.
He sent a text to the pastry chef who worked at Grizzly Peaks in the summer. Then he watched a few YouTube videos. It didn’t look that hard.
Of course he had to go shopping first. He needed flour and applesauce, baking powder and sour cream. Who knew you needed so many things to make muffins?
By the time he came back from the grocery store, the moving van was gone. He’d thought he would be finished in thirty minutes. Maybe forty.
In the end it took ninety.
But he was proud as he pulled the muffin tin from the oven. Even though they seemed oddly misshapen.
He went to the internet to figure out what he’d done wrong. Were they still edible?
It turned out they were. In fact, they were delicious.
He had a basket and a cloth napkin somewhere… Once he’d put it all together he was so proud of himself he almost took a photo for Instagram.
Then he came to his senses. Nope, this was just for her.
*
The movers were gone by three o’clock. Maureen stood in the kitchen, surrounded by boxes, and thought how odd it was that a whole life had been compressed into a truckload of boxes and moved elsewhere in less than eight hours.
Stranger still was how a bunch of rooms practically crammed with furniture and plants could seem so empty and feel so cold.
Holly was in her room, listening to music. Cathleen had found the clean sheets and made up the beds. Kelly had put a casserole in the fridge and paper plates and plastic cutlery on the kitchen counter.
Thanks to her sisters, she and Holly would make it through the night. But what about the weeks, the months, the years, to come?
Self-pity and depression were indulgences Maureen usually did her best to avoid.
But today, somehow, both were tempting. She slid to the floor, her back pressed against the fridge, and wondered if it was too early to break open the bottle of celebratory wine her real estate agent had dropped off that morning along with the double set of house keys.
“Congratulations!” Beth Gibson had said. “I hope you’ll be very happy in your new home.”
Maureen had been hard pressed to thank her. Holly’s revelation about the Realtor’s affair with Strongman had tainted her image of the older woman.
“How are your sons?” she’d asked, standing to the side of the door so one of the movers could get past.
“The eldest works in Bozeman. Advertising.” Beth had smiled proudly. “And my youngest is doing well in university.”
“Having them gone must be hard. How does Alan feel about it?” Maureen brought up Beth’s husband deliberately, just to see her reaction.
But there was no flicker of guilt or secrecy as Beth answered, “Oh, Alan misses them—we both do. But we’re busy with our work, and that helps.”
Could Holly have come to the wrong conclusion? Maureen tried to think of a valid reason for Beth to be in Max’s bedroom. Maybe she’d been checking out the house because Max wanted to put it on the market? But the two of them had appeared to be locked in an embrace…
The doorbell rang, interrupting her thoughts. Maureen checked the time on the stove. Almost four. Where had the past hour disappeared to? Wiping her hands on her torn working jeans, she went to see who it was.
Jake was on the front stoop when she opened the door. Maureen hated the way her entire system went into overdrive at the sight of him. He had a cloth-covered basket in his hands and a tentative expression on his face.
“Hi, Maureen. Welcome to the neighborhood. I baked some muffins.”