39. Maren
MAREN
We drive up to the villa in late March on a Friday afternoon, and the cypresses along the upper drive are doing the small wind-trick they were doing the first night I came up the road in the back of a staff shuttle in September, except this time I am in the passenger seat of his black car, in jeans and a soft green sweater, with a duffel bag at my feet that has, in it, three nights of clothing, my own toothbrush, and the small ceramic jar with the now-dried snowdrops that I have, after seven months in the kitchen of the staff cottage, finally moved.
He does not, on the drive up, ask me whether I am ready.
He does not, on the drive up, prepare me.
He drives. He hums, at one point, to a song on the radio neither of us actually likes.
He pulls up to the front door of the villa at four oh six, and Sebastian is on the front step in a coat over his shirtsleeves, and Sebastian, when he sees me through the windshield, does the small flicker of a smile he has, in nine years, given approximately twice.
"Miss Castellan."
"Sebastian."
"It is — currently — good to see you, miss."
"Don't miss me, Sebastian."
"Maren."
"Better."
He takes the duffel. He carries it inside.
Cassian, at my elbow, doesn’t touch my back.
In four months—at the bakery, at the studio, at the little Italian place on the bend of the coast road where we’ve been having Tuesday dinners—he has never once steered me through a doorway with a guiding hand.
What he has learned, in four months, is to walk through doorways second.
I walk through the door of the villa first.
My mother is in the foyer.
She is in the same small floral robe she travels in.
She has, behind her on the small velvet bench by the door, my father, who is doing his crossword.
She has, on the small console table beside her, a small porcelain teapot and two cups.
She has, on her face, the small new careful face she has, in seven months,been learning.
She does not, on this Friday afternoon, run at me.
She crosses, instead, with the small considered pace of a woman who is, currently,asking permission with her feet.
"Maren."
"Hi, Mom."
"Sweetheart."
"Mom."
"Cassian."
"Delilah."
"Will you sit. I have tea."
"Mom."
"What."
“Twenty minutes. We just arrived. I’m putting the duffel down and washing my face. I’ll be in the small sitting room at four-thirty for tea. With Dad. Not in the foyer. And not with Sienna.”
"Sienna is, in fact, on a walk."
"Good."
"All right, sweetheart."
She does not comment on the duffel. She does not comment on the small green sweater. She does not, in fact, ask whether I am staying in the wing. She does the small considered thing of stepping back. She lets me go up the stairs.
I go up the stairs.
Cassian, at my elbow, comes up the stairs second.
He does not, on the landing, ask me which room I want.
He does, on the landing, the small new thing he has been learning, which is to wait.
He waits for me to point. I point to the same east guest suite I should have been put in in September, the one with the separate entrance through the garden, the one with the keypad code he does not control.
He has, in fact, in February — without telling me, because Davies confirmed it on a Wednesday in passing — instructed Sebastian to remove the keypad and replace it with a regular brass lock and key.
The brass key, currently, is in my own hand, on a small black ribbon, because Sebastian handed it to me at the front door on the way in.
I open the east guest suite. I drop the duffel on the bed.
He sets the small ceramic jar of dried snowdrops on the dresser.
He leaves the dresser. He leaves the room.
He goes, in fact, to his wing — the wing — the wing — his wing, down the long corridor, the one I will not,on this stay, be sleeping in — and he does not, in passing, look back at me from the door
I allow myself the count of three.
Then I wash my face, and I go downstairs at four thirty for the tea.
My mother is, in the small sitting room, on the small velvet sofa with the porcelain teapot in front of her and a small plate of the little iced almond cookies the kitchen makes when the property has been told to put on a small spread.
My father is in the wing chair by the window.
Cassian is in the wing chair opposite. Sienna comes in,halfway through the tea, in leggings and a small puffer jacket from her walk, and she stops in the doorway when she sees me on the small velvet sofa, and her mouth, in the doorway, opens, and she closes it again, and she crosses to the sofa and she sits down beside me, and she,says nothing at all, which is, currently, the largest gift she has given me since 2003.
My mother pours.
"Sweetheart."
"Mom."
"How long — — are you staying?"
"Three nights, Mom."
"Three nights."
"Yes."
"Are you — — in the wing."
I look at her.
I look at her over the small iced almond cookie I have,just lifted off the plate.
"Mom."
"What."
"I am in the east guest suite."
"The east guest suite."
"Yes."
"Sweetheart, that is — that is, — Cassian, the east guest suite is, — "
"Delilah."
"I — Cassian, the east guest suite is for guests."
"Mom."
"What, Maren."
I explain that I’m taking the guest room down the hall. Not just tonight—any time I’m here for the next few months. Cassian’s in his wing; we’re on the same property, not the same hallway, and that’s intentional. I ask her, gently but clearly, not to press for more. Not here. Not now.
She closes her mouth.
She closes it the small clean way she closed it in the foyer in October.
"All right, sweetheart."
"Thank you, Mom."
"Maren."
"Yes."
"In essence."
"What, Mom."
"You are not engaged."
"No, Mom."
"But you are "
"Mom."
"What."
"We are not engaged. There is no ring. There is no date.
There is no calendar. There is, in fact, no fund.
There is — Mom — there is, currently, no ring.
Currently, there is a bakery. And, currently, Tuesdays.
And, currently, three nights at the villa, in two rooms. That is — Mom — that is, currently, the entire answer.
I am, currently,dating a man. I am living in a small studio at the bend in the coast road.
I am, currently, working the front desk where I have, in fact, been promoted, by Inês Pereira on the third of February, to the senior coordinator of the lower spa wing, with — Mom — a raise, which I would like,to tell you about over the small iced almond cookies and not over the porcelain teapot, because the porcelain teapot,has, in fact, intimidated me my entire life. "
Sienna makes, on the sofa next to me, the small snort of a person who is trying very hard not to laugh.
My mother looks at me—really looks—and for a moment I can’t tell which version of her I’m getting. Then she says my name, soft but steady, and I answer her the same way.
She tells me congratulations. On the lower spa wing. On the studio. On the bakery. Each one comes out like she’s placing something fragile on the table between us, careful not to break it. I thank her, because there’s nothing else to do with a mother who is trying this hard to get it right.
When she’s finished, she nods once, a small decisive motion. “All right, sweetheart,” she says, and the word lands without the usual edge.
She pours my father’s tea first, then Cassian’s, then Sienna’s, then mine.
She doesn’t ask a single follow-up question.
Not one. My father, in the wing chair by the window, lifts his cup and looks at me over the rim.
And then—quietly, privately—he winks. In twenty-six years, it’s only the second time he’s ever done it.
I drink my tea.
Cassian, in the wing chair opposite,does not say anything.
He has,in the entire small sitting room, in twenty-three minutes, said exactly the word Delilah — once — and the word tea — once, when my mother poured him a cup.
He is,currently, with me in this room without, in any minute of the tea, steering a single thing.
I look at him over the rim of my cup.
I am in this room, on this Friday in late March, at four fifty-eight, choosing him, in front of my mother, with the small iced almond cookie in my hand, in the small green sweater, without a ring, without a date, without a story.
I smile at him.
He smiles back.
I lift the cup.
"To Tuesdays."
He lifts his.
"To Tuesdays, Maren."