Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
“Surprises are foolish things.”
~ Jane Austen, Emma
S treaks of sunlight nudged Elle awake. Well, half awake. Her brain wasn’t fully firing yet, but she had a dim notion that she was no longer dreaming. Snuggling into the soft sheets, she blinkingly watched Clayton button a blue plaid shirt before rolling the cuffs up. Those forearms.
“Tease,” Elle mumbled, her voice sleep drunk.
“You’re supposed to be sleeping in.” He chuckled, stepping away from the closet and shutting the door.
“But your forearms,” she whined.
“Oh, ‘Sleepy Elle’ is back.” He moved to her side of the bed. The mattress dipped as he sat.
“You love ‘Sleepy Elle.” Elle covered an extra-large yawn with the back of her hand.
“Yeah.” He stared at her for several minutes, his fingers caressing her cheeks, eyes singing a yet unwritten song.
“She’s your favorite Elle.”
“They’re all my favorite.”
“Even Eleanor?”
“Yes.” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “They’re all you.”
“You liked me before I liked me.” She sighed, her sleepy brain taking full control of her mouth.
“You like you now, right?”
“Yeah.” She exhaled. “I do.”
“Good.” His fingers skimmed across her lips. “I’m a big fan, so I’m glad you’re joining the Elle fan club.”
“Clayton…I have a secret.Wanna know?” she whispered.
“Sure.” He bent closer.
“I’m in your fan club.”
“Oh, my, Sleepy Elle.” He kissed her softly.
“Oh, my, Awake Clayton.”
“Have fun with your friends today, baby.” He rose, turning to leave.
“I’m your baby…You too…Good day.” She yawned around the words.
When Elle rolled downstairs around ten, she was surprised to find Noah in the kitchen with a box of pastries. She wasn’t as surprised to find Willa at his side batting her eyes or Viet brewing a pot of tea. Over pastries, they made plans for sight-seeing at all of Perry’s hot spots. There weren’t many, but it was fun nonetheless. Good company made anywhere perfect.
A bit before five, Noah left them at the farmhouse to get ready for Pete’s party. A bouquet of purple roses wrapped in the Village Rose’s trademark rose-patterned paper sat on the porch. Elle slipped the card into her purse to read later knowing the flowers were from Clayton, but the card was, no doubt, a sassy note from Aunt Janet. She’d made a habit of writing a saucy note with the weekly flower delivery.
When they entered the house, Fitz immediately ran to Viet, who gathered the chubby pug in his arms, planting kisses all over his squishy face.
Clayton drove up to the farmhouse just as Elle was grabbing some things for girl time with Willa. The two would be getting ready together at the Little Red Barn.
Both Willa and Elle opted for softer looks. Willa’s long caramel locks were arranged in loose curls around her face, the pair of lilac earrings Elle bought her poking out through the silky strands. The lilac contrasted perfectly with the sky-blue sheath dress she wore.
Elle wore the tea-length, jewel-tone purple dress she’d bought while shopping with Aunt Janet. Her hair hung in its natural waves. As she gazed into the mirror, putting in her matching lilac earrings, she smiled. Purple. It had always been her favorite color and the one Clayton thought she looked beautiful in.
Just before seven, the four drove over to the VFW. Clayton volunteered to drive Elle’s rental as it had a backseat and four doors. As he held the front passenger door open for Elle, he leaned in and told her she was beautiful, stirring the butterflies in her belly. She traced the paw print tattoo exposed by his rolled-up sleeves cooing he was beautiful.
The banquet room in the VFW was a simple open space with burnt-orange walls and chocolate-brown trim. The room felt like fall every day of the year.
Aunt Janet’s decoration goddess magic had transformed the space into, as the gold banner hung over the bar proclaimed, Studio Fifty . Shiny blue and gold fabric covered the burnt orange walls. A shimmer flooded the room from the reflection of multicolored fairy lights in a mirror ball suspended above the dance floor. Thin gold vines twined around circular tables draped in bright blue tablecloths.
A large DJ booth with a rainbow of strobe lights was pressed up against the far wall. The DJ adorned in a black top hat and Van Halen T-shirt stood behind a large sound panel like a king surveying his court.
Elle wove through the throngs of familiar and not-so-familiar faces to find the birthday boy.
“Lady Elle! Big Buddy! New Friends!” Jerome swaggered over, holding a bottle of Doc Owens beer.
“Where’s the rest of the Coates clan?” Elle inquired as Jerome gave her one of his signature bear hugs.
“Tobey’s at the bar.” He cocked his head toward the bar along the far-left wall, surrounded by people getting drinks. “Mom’s at the DJ booth and I haven’t seen Second Dad yet.”
“Attention!” The DJ’s deep voice boomed in the mic, as the music trailed off to a quiet hum. “Everyone gird your loins; the man of the hour is here. Gather around the dance floor and welcome the man who ages like fine wine or stinky cheese…Pete Coates!”
The room erupted in clapping hoots, hollers, and whistles as “Hot Stuff” by Donna Summer played. Pete hustled onto the dance floor in a white disco suit a la John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever .
“Is he doing the lawnmower?” Viet gaped, as Pete pumped his arms up and down as if pulling the cord for an engine and then pushing it around the dance floor.
“Yup.” Clayton and Jerome laughed in unison.
As Pete wiggled around the dance floor, he stopped and bellowed, “Looking for the Olivia Newton John to my John Travolta.”
That was Aunt Janet’s cue to saunter over to him with a sexy sashay of her hips. The two of them mirrored each other’s dance moves. They rocked their hips, tapped their feet, and raised their arms to the cheers of everyone. Pete held his hand out and his wife placed hers in his, letting him spin her around the room.
“Your family really likes a choreographed dance number, don’t they?” Clayton teased, threading his arms around Elle’s waist, tucking her into his chest.
“Yup.” Elle grinned.
As they stood watching, her gaze caught a pair of sad blue eyes across the room, looking past Pete and Janet and directly to her.
Mom. The historical dread and hurt of seeing her mother that normally crumbled Elle in its oppressive grip was absent. In its place was sadness, disappointment…and indifference. The power her mom held on her had slipped away after their encounter Wednesday morning.
Elle had told her mom that they were “done,” and they were. At least, she was done.
“Wanna get a drink?” Clayton asked, the soothing glide of his hands over her midsection told Elle he hadn’t missed her mom’s stare.
Her face tipped up to him, their gazes mingling. “Are you finally going to buy me that free drink?”
“Sure am.” He pressed grinning lips to hers.
The bar was still lively but had thinned since Pete and Janet had called folks to join them on the dance floor. Tobey leaned on the bar, sipping a Yellowjacket beer and talking to Noah. Elle and Tobey commiserated in mortification at the dance stylings of his mother and father… mostly his father. The moment Pete dropped it like it was hot had Tobey considering changing his name to Evans and fully dropping Coates all together. Elle nursed a Doc Owens beer alongside her actual Doc Owens and her cousin before joining Willa, Viet, and Jerome on the dance floor. Carmen and Mathew appeared shortly after, as if manifested with a single wish. Almost all of her people were in one place.
There was no rhyme or reason to the songs bumping through the banquet hall turned nightclub. When Elle hit the dance floor, ABBA played, then it flowed into New Kids on the Block, next DMX, followed by Taylor Swift. When the DJ spun the Spice Girls, Elle and Viet laughed through their made-up dance routine.
Willa and Elle dragged Noah and Clayton onto the floor to join them. By the last lines of the song, Elle was encircled with all her people; Clayton on her right, Pete on her left, and everyone else just a gaze away. On the edge of the dance floor stood Summer, bobbing her head with the music, smiling as she watched the swaying party goers. Elle raced over and pulled Summer to join them. The sensation of completion surged in her chest.
As the party bumped along, full of swinging hips, sipping lips, hugging arms, and laughing hearts, Elle snuck off the dance floor to help Aunt Janet check on the refreshment table.
“I think it’s dessert time.” Janet declared, as they surveyed the mostly empty snack trays.
Elle picked up two trays. “We should move these into the kitchen to consolidate onto one tray and put it back out with the cupcakes.”
Janet picked up a couple trays and followed Elle to the kitchen.
Elle consolidated the remaining appetizers onto one tray as Aunt Janet recruited volunteers to bring other items into the kitchen and take the cupcakes out. Virginia and Summer’s dad, who was Janet’s cousin, along with some random man with black hair streaked with wisps of silver rotated in and out of the kitchen as Janet pulled out multiple cupcake trays filled with a kaleidoscope of colored frosting and flavors. The regular size fridge was like a clown car of cupcakes, they just kept multiplying.
“Elle, you almost done?” Janet asked, twisting to look over her shoulder as she stood holding the door as Virginia carried out the last of the cupcakes.
“Just about done.” Elle bit her bottom lip in concentration as she organized the assortment of snack trays into one super one.
“Alright.” Janet followed Virginia out of the kitchen.
As the door shut, the room quieted, a gentle hum and light vibration slinked in from the music in the other room.
“No more cupcakes?” A low masculine voice asked, a twinge of relieved astonishment lacing the words.
“Virginia and Janet just took the last tray of them out.” Elle looked up from the tray she’d been working on.
It was the random man that had been helping them. Happy crinkles hugged the edges of his eyes. A sliver of green swam in his brown eyes like moss drifting atop a muddy pond. Despite the silver in his black hair, he had a youthful glow in his handsome face.
“There was a minute I thought about opening the fridge to make sure it wasn’t like the wardrobe in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe but instead of ending up in Narnia with Mr. Tumnus, it would take me to a land of never-ending cupcakes.” He laughed, pointing to the fridge. “Well, just to be sure…” he opened the fridge door. “… phew ! Normal fridge.”
“I thought of it as a clown car fridge.” Laughter lit her face.
“Good image.” He placed his hands on the kitchen island’s surface, his eyes gazing at the tray. “Nice work. I love the swirling patterns of functionality. Like you have everything that would go together…well… together.”
“Thank you.” Elle smiled, peering down at her tray. The circular parallel rows of corresponding food pleased her. It was both pretty and practical. “Thanks for helping with the cupcakes.”
“To be of service is to love,” he said, the green in his eyes seemed to sparkle, making Elle think of Santa. This man looked nothing like Santa with his tall broad form and face clean of any whiskers or even a whisper of stubble. But he had a cheerfully generous energy radiating from him as if any minute he’d pull out a big bag of presents.
“I like that. It sounds like something that would be stitched on a pillow.”
“Fun fact, that’s where I saw it. It was on a pillow at the house of one of my buddies from Fort Knox. His wife had made it. It just always stuck with me.” His long fingers tapped against the metal counter, drumming the beat of the song vibrating from the other room.
“Pillows can be very profound.”
“I’ve got some of my best advice from them,” he said with a self-deprecating chuckle.
“Fort Knox? You were in the service?”
“Yep.” He straightened as if his commanding officer had walked into the room. “I retired from the Army after twenty years. Now I work at the VA in Buffalo.”
“Wow. You retired to work more? You must really enjoy being of service.” Elle joked.
Smirking, he shrugged.
“Seriously though, that’s great. I’m in healthcare too. What do you do at the VA?”
“I’m the Chief of Chaplain Service. I was an Army Chaplain and I’ve continued the work once I retired,” he explained.
Elle’s eyes grew wide. Chaplain? Pastor?
“Pastor Danny?” It was less of a question, more of an accusation.
“That’s what they call me, but I prefer Daniel. I’m Daniel Kwon.” He extended his hand. “I’m not going to pretend to not know who you are or that you don’t know who I am. It’s an honor to meet you, Eleanor. Your mom has told me so much about you.”
She hesitated but took his hand. The open kindness in his demeanor overtook the sting from the relationship with her mom and interactions with her mom’s past boyfriends. Her hackles didn’t rise in his presence. Her gut kicked back, waving its hands for her to proceed.
“I promise you I wasn’t trying to ambush you. I was at the refreshment table when Janet appeared. When I saw you in here, I debated introducing myself. I didn’t want you to feel cornered, but I wanted to meet you. Your mom has told me so many stories about her amazing daughter and when we’ve been with your aunt and uncle, they talk a lot about you. You’ve kind of become like a mythical being. I think I needed to talk to you to make sure you truly existed.”
“Well…I’m real. Just an average woman.” She turned, washing her hands in the sink after placing the last fried mushroom ball in the center of the second chance tray.
“Definitely not average.”
“So, you’ve been with her for four years?” Elle said, her back to him as she allowed the lukewarm water to run over her soapy hands. She should politely excuse herself and rejoin her people in the other room instead of standing here talking to yet another one of her mom’s doomed relationships. No doubt he’d leave soon, just like all the others.
She idly wondered how many boyfriends there had been between Jamie and Daniel. Her mother had never been okay with being alone, always in search of something to quell the loneliness that plagued her. Never realizing that she wasn’t alone, she had Elle. She had herself.
“Yeah. We met at the nursing home where she works. I visit veterans living in the Assisted Living and Nursing Homes across the area.” His eyes grew wistful with memory. “During her breaks or after her shift, she’d read to some of the residents. I kept seeing her sitting in different rooms. After a month of just noticing her, I walked into one of my fellow veterans’ rooms and found her sitting beside him reading aloud. I finally talked to her.”
“What was she reading?”
It was a silly question, but the need to know nibbled at Elle. Her mom had never been a big reader. She wasn’t sure where her love of books had come from. Reading had dominated her first friendship with Summer as little girls, then bonded her to Carmen and Beth in high school, and now fueled her love with Clayton.
“ Sense and Sensibility ,” he replied.
“What?” Elle whirled around, her wet hands dripping onto the brown and gold tile floor.
“Yeah. I hadn’t read it. She said it was her daughter’s copy. I guess you had left it behind.” The cadence of his words was cautious. “Your mom reads that book at least three times a year. Our first conversation was about you. She talked about how smart you were and how your nose was always stuck in a book. She talked about how talented you were with your French horn. She talked about how kind, strong, smart, and beautiful you were. She always said ‘were,’ making me think you had died. It was always in the past tense.”
“Well, I am very much alive, just not….” She stopped speaking, not knowing quite how to finish that sentence, so instead she wiped her hands on a paper towel.
“It took six months for her to agree to go out on a date with me.”
Elle stared, dumbstruck at the idea of her mom, who was so quick to fall in love, waiting so long to go on a date with this attractive, accomplished, and, by all appearances and what Uncle Pete had said, nice man. The mother she grew up with would have only waited six seconds before agreeing to go on a date.
“I took her for coffee on our first date. It was the only thing she’d agree to. We talked for hours until the shop closed. We talked about you mostly. She told me you were alive and that she wasn’t part of your life anymore. She said she’d lost that privilege.”
“She gave it up,” Elle snapped.
“It’s a loss whether we give it up or it’s taken away. We still grieve,” he said, his tone tender. “I’m sorry. I know I’m overstepping. It’s probably the soldier in me. I don’t know when to give up a battle. I don’t know everything, but I know she blames herself.” Daniel raised his hands in surrender at Elle’s glower. “As she should. I’m not going to make excuses for her or make her apologies to you. That’s not my place. I just wanted… I don’t know what I wanted. I was just helping with cupcakes and then you were here. I just wanted to meet you. I also wanted to check in on you.”
“Why? You don’t know me,” Elle hissed, the fingers of her right hand traced her starfish pendant to ground herself.
“Your mom is worried about you after the last few times she saw you. She can’t check on you directly. She can’t talk to your uncle or aunt because she doesn’t know what you’ve told them and doesn’t want to betray you to them. Tobey isn’t speaking to her right now so she can’t ask him.” He frowned. “She’ll kill me for doing this, but when you really love someone, sometimes you overstep…So, here I am, overstepping. How are you doing, Eleanor?”
“You must really love her.” Elle’s ire leached out of her.
This man who’d never met her, who was dating her estranged mother, was in a kitchen asking her how she’s doing. The weirdest part of it was the sincerity in each syllable. He truly wanted to know how she was. He truly cared. This man loved her mother so much that he was ready to risk the tension and potential wrath to have this conversation with Elle.
“I do. I want to marry her.”
“She’ll love that,” she muttered.
“Well, she keeps turning me down.” His smile was mournful.
“What? Why?” Elle’s jaw went slack.
The key driver for her mother since her dad left was finding someone, anyone to fill that void in her heart. Boyfriend after boyfriend and date after date, Elle’s mom searched for her Prince Charming. A man to sweep her off her feet, so she’d never be alone again.
None of her previous choices proved worthy of the role of being her mom’s husband or Elle’s stepdad. Daniel in his pink polo shirt with a tiny green alligator logo, tan slacks, Converse sneakers, and earnest stare looked the picture of a standup guy.
Daniel was a good guy. Uncle Pete had said so when they took Lt. Scout and Fitz on a walk a few weeks ago. He had never said that of any of her mother’s other boyfriends.
“She lost the great love of her life,” Daniel said sadly.
“My father?” Elle scoffed, then her heart sank in horrified realization. Jamie? The bile threatened to rise at that thought. Was Jamie her mom’s great love?
His stare locked with hers. “No. You.”
“You’re mistaken. I was her consolation prize.” Elle’s arms wrapped around her middle in a steadying self-embrace.
“No child should ever feel that way…” He sighed. “That’s why she blames herself. So many mistakes she made.”
“Yet you want to marry her,” Elle said incredulous.
“I do.” He paused, looking around the room before focusing his gaze back on her. “I wouldn’t want to be measured by the sum of my past mistakes, so I try not to do that to others. There’s no expiration date on forgiveness, neither for ourselves, nor for others. As long as someone is truly sorry and changes. Apology without action is just manipulation. I think she’s changed. I know I’m not a good judge as I have only had the pleasure of loving Amanda as she is now. You had the misfortune of knowing who she used to be. You deserved better. I’d like to believe she’s better.”
Elle’s chest pinched as Daniel spoke. There were as many versions of her mother as there were of Elle. She had once been Eleanor, a stoically sad and lonely girl. Then she was an Elle who was walled off, holding others at arm’s length. Even the select few she allowed to come close enough to touch the layers of brick around her heart were never actually granted entrance. Now, she was healing and taking down that wall. Two versions of her mother dance in her heart. The “smile like nobody is looking” mom with deep belly laughs and endless supply of hugs and kisses, who giggled with her as they read the police blotter. Then there is the mom after her dad left, broken and wanting, with a not quite real smile plastered on her face, whose sea of embraces for her daughter had dried up. Daniel spoke of this new version of her mother; one Elle did not know.
One she will never know. It’s too risky for Elle’s recently put back together heart, the once tattered pieces are still fusing back into place.
“Daniel, it’s too late.” Elle’s voice was small.
“Is it? I think if it was, truly, you wouldn’t have indulged my overstepping.”
Elle shook her head.
“Ok, then. How are you?”
“I’m good.” She replied, her trembling voice leveling. “I have good people in my life. You can tell her that. She doesn’t need to worry about me.”
“Ok.” He tucked his hands in his pockets. “I am sorry. I really didn’t mean to have this conversation. I was just helping with the cupcakes, but when God opens a door, you need to decide whether to walk through it or walk away. I clearly walked through.”
“You sure did.” Elle smiled at this very sweet, if a tad intrusive, man. “I’m glad she has you.” And she really was.