Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Okay,” June said to herself. “I got keys. I got my wallet. I got the book. I got… where did that wine go?”
She spun, eyes darting around the kitchen, until she saw the bottle of wine that she’d purchased for book club sitting on top of her microwave. Well, it was anyone’s guess why she’d put it there, but if she found it, she wasn’t going to ask any more questions.
She was too tired to worry about any extraneous questions. She was honestly probably too tired for book club, but skipping felt like giving in. She wasn’t sure what she was giving in to… but she was too tired for that, also.
So she was going. She was going to push down any guilt over how she always seemed to be grabbing and bringing a bottle of wine instead of making any of the elaborate, beautiful, delicious dishes that her friends often brought to book club meetings.
All of that would wait for a day when she hadn’t worked two jobs, helped with a thousand tiny kid disasters, and worried about five million other minor kid disasters that threatened to loom around every corner.
So… when Benjamin went to college. Yeah, she’d pencil it all in for around that time.
“Okay, baby,” she said as she headed into the living room, where Benjamin and Mrs. Richards had pizza and board games set up on the coffee table.
Her son loved book club night, because it was the one night a month where he got to eat dinner in the living room and was allowed as much screen time as he wanted before bedtime.
He and Mrs. Richards were apparently both very deeply involved in some kind of kid’s show about dogs in space.
June trusted the older woman to set appropriate content limits, so she didn’t ask questions and counted herself lucky.
She’d seen enough kids’ television to last more than a lifetime.
“I’m not a baby,” Benjamin protested, not looking away from his game of Scrabble, Jr. “I’m a kid.”
“You’re always going to be my baby,” she teased him, as she always did, pressing a kiss to his cheek. He made a big show of pretending to wipe it off, but his smile gave him away. “Now, you’re going to be well-behaved for Mrs. Richards, right?”
The elderly woman and the boy both looked at June, clearly offended.
“This little angel?” Mrs. Richards asked. “When is he not?”
“Yeah, Mom!” Benjamin said, grinning his gap-toothed smile. “I’m an angel!”
June pursed her lips. “Okay, okay. Well, you two have fun, okay? I’ll see you in the morning, Ben.”
Her son gave her a vague wave before he placed letters and then began celebrating his double word score.
June jumped into her car and headed toward Eleanor’s house. She was halfway there before she realized that thing that she always conveniently forgot until the worst possible moment: pushing down her feelings didn’t ever work.
This time, it was driving past the diner that did it. She thought back to that day where she’d sung “Lollipop” for Benjamin, the day when Eleanor had complimented her on her voice. It had felt so good to sing again. And she wanted that to have been enough.
But it wasn’t.
She missed a million things about having Keith by her side.
She missed his laugh, missed watching shows that she loved and he pretended to hate.
She missed hearing him breathe next to her at night.
There was no ranking to these things, nor was there any counting them.
After two years, she’d learned that grief took different forms, and that those forms morphed and were formed anew when different life experiences arose.
Today, it was the support to pursue her passions that she missed.
Parenting was tough, but with two people, there was someone to share the load.
Now, it was all her, all the time. And it was hard, no matter how much she adored her son, to feel like every single moment of every single day was spoken for.
To feel like she never had time for a break, or to take a breath.
With a bittersweet smile, she thought back to those days when Benjamin was a toddler.
Once a month or so, she and Cadence would leave Benjamin and Izzy with their dads while they went out for karaoke night.
It had been a blast, even if Cadence was more of a cheerleader than a singer herself.
When she’d gotten home, Keith would always demand a reenactment of her performance, even if they’d had to conduct it at a whisper so that they didn’t wake up Benjamin.
Every time, he’d declared that her performance was her best yet, that she was destined for stardom, that she was the best singer in the world. He had a million overblown compliments that he had meant with his whole heart.
A gentle honking of a car horn behind her alerted June to the fact that she’d been sitting in front of a green light for goodness only knew how long.
She raised a hand to the driver behind her in a quick apology, then wiped her eyes where they’d begun to grow a little damp, and drove the rest of the way to Eleanor’s.
She made sure she took a steadying breath before going inside. She didn’t want to bring the mood down.
Indeed, her friends all greeted her with shouts of welcome after she came through the door.
“June, yay!” Cadence called, waving.
“We were just starting to get a little worried,” Eleanor said, crossing the room to trade the bottle of wine in June’s hand for a glass of red that was already filled and waiting for her.
“You were starting to worry, you old mother hen,” Miriam said with a wink. “I assumed she was off being young and fun.”
“Calling me old,” Eleanor grumbled without any heat.
“Alas, no,” June said. “I was just living the super glamorous life of… being late for mysterious but kid-related reasons.”
“Oh, yeah,” Cadence said, nodding in commiseration. “They are magical little time warps. You blink and bam, an hour is gone. Or you do something for an hour and weirdly it’s only been, like, two minutes.”
“You people ain’t seen nothing yet,” Eleanor scoffed. “Call me when you sneeze and suddenly they’re in college. That’s the professional leagues, ladies.”
Everyone laughed. June dropped into her chair, feeling a little less weary than she had earlier in the night. Coming to book club had been the right idea. Spending time with her friends was always worth the energy, even when she felt like taking another step was the hardest thing in the world.
“Speaking of,” Eleanor interjected, “how is Benjamin?”
“Oh, yeah,” Cadence added. “Izzy has been asking when we can do a make-up play date.”
“Yeah, I don’t want to say that it’s been a touch insulting,” Diana added, hiding a smile behind the rim of her wine glass, “but I believe the direct quote was, ‘Sorry, Auntie Diana, you’re not as good at playing magna-tiles as Benjamin is.’”
Diana laughed, while Cadence dropped her head heavily against her hand.
“We might have to have a quick little refresher on politeness,” Cadence mumbled. Diana brushed the concern away.
“No, she said sorry first. That counts.”
“Well, Benjamin would also love to reschedule,” June said. “He’s feeling completely fine. It was just a bug, gone as quick as it came.”
“Oh, good,” Eleanor said. “That means we can discuss something way more important and that is that our little June Caldwell here has an amazing singing voice. Did you all know about this?”
She proceeded to tell the group, in detail that made June blush to her hairline, about the “Lollipop” dance routine she’d done for Benjamin. She even imitated a few of June’s dance moves.
When the laughter died down, Eleanor wrapped an arm around June’s shoulders. “All teasing aside, she’s amazing. So, again, I ask: did you know about this?”
“I did!” Cadence volunteered, lifting a hand.
“Well, I did not!” Miriam said, sounding affronted. “I want to hear a performance!”
“Not right now,” June protested.
“She means not ever,” Diana said in a faux-whisper to Cadence, who nodded sagely.
June feigned innocence, as she did in fact mean that she planned to put that little performance off… forever.
“No, not right now, of course,” Miriam said. That, June knew, was way too easy. “There’s a new open mic night going on a couple of times per month at Anchor Bistro. You should perform there, Miss June.”
“Um, no,” June said.
“Um, yes,” Diana mimicked.
June blew out a breath. “Okay, I mean, that sounds like it could be fun, but… I am busy, guys. Like busy, busy. My monthly leisure dispensation is happening right here, right now.” She spread her arms to illustrate her point.
“But—” Miriam began, although she cut herself off when Cadence kicked the bottom of the older woman’s chair lightly and gave her a meaningful look. She sighed. “Okay, very well, I won’t press… for now.”
“Your forbearance is appreciated,” June said with a chuckle. Then, eager to get attention off her, she turned to Eleanor. “Regale us with tales of business ownership, will you?”
This line of conversation was usually a reliable route to get Eleanor smiling, if not because of her excitement about the bookstore then because she got to talk about her handsome beau. Today, however, Eleanor frowned and dropped her forehead against the palm of her hand.
“Uh oh,” Miriam said.
Eleanor held up a finger. “Okay, it’s only a maybe ‘uh oh,’” she clarified. “But Winnie Burnett came around earlier today—”
“Uh oh,” Cadence said.
Everyone looked at her sharply at the interjection. Cadence shrugged.
“Winnie is a couple years younger than me, but when she moved to Magnolia Shore when we were in high school, she… took things by storm.”
“What Cadence means to say,” Diana said, feigning a whisper, “is that she is very afraid of Winnie.”
Cadence didn’t even look abashed. “It’s more like a combined fear and awe,” she said. “She’s always put together. And I have literally never seen her be wrong about something.”
“It’s the hair,” Diana said. “She has really good hair.”
June nodded. Winnie did always look great, and she had the kind of style where that required precision.
“She’s always at town hall meetings,” Miriam added with a distinct grumble.
“Which you know because you’re never at town meetings?” June asked innocently.
To this, Miriam gave another, even more distinct grumble.
“Wow, thank you!” Eleanor said, a touch snappishly.
“This is all so helpful!” Then she crumpled.
“Sorry, sorry. I’m being a jerk. It’s just that she told me that if I don’t fill out a bunch of permits, I’m going to end up buried in fines.
So I was hoping to hear that actually she’s somebody who has never been right about anything. ”
Diana crinkled her nose. “Ah.”
“Yeah,” Eleanor said with a sigh. “It’s stressful. But I’m trying to keep a good attitude about it all.”
“Oh, I can do you one better than that,” Miriam said.
“Miss Winnie Burnett with her, yes, I admit it, impeccable sense of style, might be very knowledgeable about town bylaws, but you, Eleanor, my darling, have a secret weapon.” She gestured to herself.
“Moi. I can out-busybody Miss Burnett any day of the week and I’m retired, so I have nothing but time to help. ”
“Nothing but time and forty-seven other committees,” Diana said.
“You, a busybody?” Candence said. “Never!”
“I cannot hear whippersnappers or naysayers!” Miriam declared loudly. “If you get afoul of any town laws, give me a call. I’d love to help.”
“Well, I will accept that help happily,” Eleanor said, looking relieved already.
“I might have spent twenty years married to a lawyer, but that doesn’t mean I’m one myself.
The word ‘bylaws’ on its own makes me break out in hives.
I was going to muscle through it for the sake of making my dream come true, but… ”
“But what are friends for if not helping you?” Miriam finished.
Eleanor laughed, her worries practically vanishing before June’s eyes. “Yes, exactly. Thanks, Miriam.”
The chatter turned briefly back to Eleanor’s upcoming renovation plans before the group started to turn their attention to the book they’d read for this month’s meeting. June tried to pay attention, but she found her mind drifting.
Eleanor looked so hopeful every time she talked about her bookstore, even when she was dealing with complications.
June could barely remember the last time she’d felt that way about something, the last time she’d seen something she wanted and made it happen with the power in her own two hands…
and the hands of some friends when she needed help.
No matter how much she tried to fight it, her mind kept drifting back to what Eleanor had said about her singing. Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing to go to an open mic sometime, or even grab a karaoke session with one of her friends…
She dismissed the idea again, however. It was impractical, surely.
The things she had in her life was enough. Definitely, it was enough. She didn’t need singing.
She wished she sounded a bit more convincing even in her own head.