Chapter 49
By six o’clock on Wednesday evening, I’ve had enough.
My eyes are sore and my back hurts from spending so much time sitting in a cheap office chair.
I step into the living room and close the office door—a symbolic gesture that helps me compartmentalize between my work and home lives—then go into the bedroom and change out of my sweatpants and T-shirt.
I’m exhausted, and rather than waiting for Sam to come home and cooking, it just feels easier to go out for dinner.
There’s a cute and inexpensive taco place we have been wanting to try ever since we moved in.
I’m about to text him and suggest that we meet at the restaurant when there’s a knock at the door.
It’s Jennifer. She has an envelope in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.
She holds out the envelope. “This found its way into our mailbox by mistake. I’ve been meaning to bring it around for a couple of days.”
I take the mail and look at it. A credit card bill. “You shouldn’t have bothered.”
“I know, right?” Jennifer laughs nervously. She holds up the bottle. “I brought a gift to say thank you for your wonderful dinner party the other night. Frank and I had such a good time.”
“That’s so thoughtful,” I say, reaching for the bottle, but Jennifer doesn’t seem willing to part with it.
“It’s petite sirah. My favorite. I thought maybe we could pop the cork and have a glass,” she suggests with a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Get to know each other a little better, girl to girl.”
“I’d love to,” I reply. “But I was just going out—”
At that moment, my phone dings. It’s a text message from Sam.
Stuck in a meeting at work. Looks like it will be a late one. Sorry.
I choke back my disappointment. I was looking forward to getting out of the apartment and trying somewhere new to eat, but it appears that it won’t happen. At least not tonight. Which sucks, because Sam hardly ever works late.
“Everything okay, my dear?” Jennifer asks.
“Uh-huh.” I slip the phone into my pocket, and my gaze falls to the bottle of wine. What the hell . . . I might as well make the best of a bad situation. I open the door wider and motion for her to enter. “Please, come on in.”
Jennifer grins. “You sure I’m not intruding? You looked uncertain a few moments ago.”
“Yeah. I thought we were going out to dinner, but Sam got held up at work.”
“Well, his loss is my gain.” Jennifer walks through the foyer and into the living room. She holds up the bottle. “Yours, too. This is one of my favorites. It’s from a wonderful little boutique winery in Napa Valley that my husband and I discovered many years ago on our travels.”
“Really?” I grab a couple of wineglasses and hand a corkscrew to Jennifer. “Sam and I got engaged in Napa Valley.”
“Ooh. How romantic.” Jennifer pulls the cork and pours two ample glasses.
“It really was,” I say, remembering how Sam arranged a surprise vacation and wouldn’t reveal our destination until we arrived at the airport.
After we landed in San Francisco, he drove us to a guesthouse surrounded by quaint family-owned wineries.
That evening, when we went out to dinner at a fancy restaurant more expensive than our meager budget would normally allow, I knew something was afoot.
I was right. He asked me to marry him on a terrace overlooking a tranquil landscape dotted with vineyards as far as the eye could see, with the sun slipping down behind the distant Mayacamas Mountains and setting the sky ablaze in shades of fiery red and orange.
Naturally, I said yes. That was twelve months ago.
Jennifer listens to my tale of Sam’s proposal as we settle on the couch and sip our wine. Then she asks the obvious question. “When are you planning to get married?”
“We were originally thinking the fall of next year,” I tell her. “At least until the house we were purchasing fell through, which put our plans on hold.” I glance around the living room. “But then we found this place, so we might be able to get married next year, after all.”
“That all sounds so romantic. Your parents must be overjoyed.”
“They are. My mother was in full-blown wedding-planning mode until the hiccup with our home purchase. I’m sure that she’ll be right back to it at any time, now that we’re settled.”
“As she should be.” A wistful expression passes across Jennifer’s face. “I always looked forward to the day my own daughter would get married, but sadly, it wasn’t meant to be.”
There’s a moment of uneasy silence because I’m not quite sure what to say. Clearly, something happened to Jennifer’s daughter, but I’m not sure how to ask what it was.
In the end, she answers my unspoken question on her own. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. Frank and I had a daughter. Amanda. She died in her twenties.”
Now it’s my turn to say I’m sorry.
“It’s quite all right. It happened a long time ago.
Almost fifteen years.” A wistful look crosses Jennifer’s face.
“Goodness, it still feels like it was only yesterday. I have such fond memories of us all out in Napa. Those long evenings at the vineyards, soaking up the atmosphere. I would do anything to get those moments back.”
“Your daughter loved wine, too?” I ask, even though the real question I want to ask is how she died at such a young age. But that would be crass. If Jennifer doesn’t want to tell me, then that’s her prerogative.
“It was a shared passion.” Jennifer looks up with a wan smile. “I’m sure you have a similar connection with your mother. Something the two of you bond over.”
I really don’t. My mother and I have gone down different paths.
She has become more materialistic, judging everyone by the car they drive and the size of their house, while striving to outdo them at every turn.
I have learned to look for joy in the small things and not hang my happiness upon the size of my bank account or how much better I’m doing than the neighbors.
I don’t say that, though. Instead, I jump to my feet and grab the wine bottle from the kitchen. “How about I top us up?”
“That sounds like a fine idea.” Jennifer holds her glass out while I refill it, then takes a hearty gulp before asking me about the coffee shop project and how it’s coming along.
I’m more than happy to talk about something that doesn’t involve dead daughters, and we spend the next two hours discussing everything from my work to the fine selection of restaurants in the Back Bay and how much the area has changed in the decade since they moved into the Glendale.
We polish off the first bottle and open a second, which I grab from the drink fridge under the island.
It isn’t anywhere near as expensive as the one that Jennifer brought around, and it’s not a petite sirah, but she doesn’t seem to notice.
We sit and talk for another half hour before her phone makes a small sound.
“It’s Frank. He’s getting worried. Wants to know if I’ve been kidnapped.” She checks the time, then stands up. “Goodness. It’s after nine. I should go before he sends out a search party.”
I follow her to the door. “I’m so pleased you came around. This has been fun.”
“It has. We’ll have to do it again sometime.” She steps out into the hallway, then turns back toward me. “A word of advice, my dear. Don’t let life get in the way of marrying Sam. You seem like such a loving couple, so good together. I do hope it stays that way.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s just that . . . well . . . this apartment has . . .” Jennifer glances around the empty hallway.
“What about our apartment?” I ask.
“It’s not important. Forget I said anything.” Then she turns and hurries away, leaving me staring after her.