Chapter 13 Audrey #3
Not that I was getting ahead of myself. But my own mom had had an infinite capacity for love—that’s what had made her such a beloved doctor, a second mother to my friends, why Carly had made her Stephen’s backup guardian before he was even born.
I would be the same. For the first time since Mom died, since losing the Core Four, I finally felt like I was coming alive.
By the third week of dating, Clay told me he loved me. “Wow. Already?” I said. But I was smiling.
“When you know, you just know,” he said. “Come on, admit it. You’re already crazy about me.”
I definitely was crazy about the idea of him, the widower carpenter and his little girl, the instant family.
It really was so perfect, so seamless. I was happier than I’d been in ages.
Talk was easy between us—work, the news, tales of my life in Vermont and, of course, stories about Mathilda.
I was hungry to know her more. “She’s gonna love you,” Clay said.
“Now mind, it’ll take a little adjustment.
She was her mama’s little shadow.” His eyes glistened, and he swallowed hard, but he smiled at me.
She’d been almost four when her mother died, so Clay didn’t think she remembered too much.
But I imagined she’d remember the feeling of her mother’s love.
That unconditional, smitten maternal adoration Mom had given to both Stephen and me.
I’d give Mathilda that, too. I’d been waiting a decade to give my love to someone.
Besides that, I loved Clay’s accent, his easygoing ways, his eyes, his roughened hands. He was funny and charming and excellent in bed. He laughed often and thought I was fascinating, said he loved my accent and teased me about being a Northerner.
And he was tragic. For better or worse, it heightened his appeal.
He had adored Caroline, his wife. They’d struggled with infertility for a few years before getting pregnant, only to have poor Caroline be diagnosed with ovarian cancer during her pregnancy.
“We couldn’t treat it right away,” Clay told me, wiping his eyes.
“She wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize the pregnancy. ”
Damn. I loved Caroline myself. I’ve got them, I told her, lying in the bed she once slept in and trying not to feel like a usurper.
I’ll take care of them, Caroline. I ordered books on step-parenting from E.
Shaver’s. I’d commemorate Caroline’s birthdays, stay close with her parents, understand that Mathilda would feel wary in the beginning.
I would accept—and insist—that Mathilda would always be Clay’s first priority, and mine, too.
The last thing I wanted was for her to feel displaced.
If we wanted another child, I still had some good breeding years ahead .
. . My mother had had me at thirty-nine, and Gran had been thirty-seven when Mom was born. Or we’d adopt. We had plenty of time.
Eight months after I snatched Mathilda from death by pickup truck, Clay and I got engaged.
We picked out the ring together, and when he put it on my finger at the counter of Anderson’s Jewelers, he said, “I guess it’s official now.
” His eyes were teary. At the time, I thought it was because he loved me.
Later, I guessed it was because he wasn’t over Caroline.
The next day, Clay called his in-laws. “I’ve got some happy news,” he said, then held the phone away from his ear, wincing as Betty screeched in rage. I flinched, too, at some of the words—carpetbagger, outsider, loose woman (really?), interloper.
Okay, then. Winning her over would take a little time.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” he said to me when he hung up, looking a little shaken. “They don’t want to meet you just yet.”
Turned out the house had been a gift from Caroline’s parents, and they were not about to have that Northern woman living in there (same as Gran didn’t want Dad’s wives to live on the farm).
No, they would certainly not come to the wedding, and they sure as hell wouldn’t babysit so we could take a honeymoon, not even for an overnight.
I wrote them a letter saying how much I admired Caroline, how sorry I was for their loss, how much I intended to honor their daughter’s memory and be a kind and loving stepmother to Mathilda. They didn’t answer. Okay. Well, soon Mathilda would tell them how great I was, and eventually, they’d thaw.
The four times I interacted with Mathilda before the wedding (not counting saving her life), she was truculent, not answering my questions or accepting my offers to play with or read to her.
I wanted to spend more time with her before we moved in together, but Clay said he was old-fashioned and wanted her to know me as her stepmama, not some lady he was dating.
Our small wedding was performed by a justice of the peace in Forsyth Park.
I wore a simple white dress (no bridesmaids), and the guests were Stephen, Dad (currently between wives), Gran and Pop-Pop, two of Clay’s friends, Mr. and Mrs. Beaufort, and Skylar and Paisley, who seemed irked that I’d found a spouse before they had.
Mathilda sat under a magnolia tree and yelled out the lyrics to “Wheels on the Bus” throughout the ceremony.
The brief exchange of vows was followed by dinner at the Olde Pink House, a Savannah institution.
Mathilda had a meltdown when informed they were out of pecan pie, and Clay had to carry her outside to get her to calm down (which took forty-five minutes), but otherwise, I told myself it was a beautiful day.
Except for when I had to go into the bathroom and sob because I missed my mom so much.
Except when I pictured Beck, Jasmine and Micah in long dresses, all of us giggling and hugging.
Except when Stephen, who’d met Clay only once before then, asked me how well I knew him.
“Why?” I asked. “What’s the matter?”
“Oh, nothing,” Stephen said. “He just seems a little . . . absent.”
“Well, his mind is on Mathilda. And of course, today brings up memories of his first wife.”
“He told me a lot about her. Caroline, that is,” Stephen said.
I understood what he was implying, horribly and immediately.
That maybe Clay wasn’t over Caroline, had just been looking for a wife, any wife.
That maybe Clay didn’t really know me, or need to know me, as long as I checked the right boxes.
Single. Attractive. Willing to take on Mathilda.
Noticing my stricken expression, Stephen added, “No, no, Auds. I’m sure you’re right. He’s a really nice guy.”
Shit. But no, not shit! Clay was a great guy. And we did love each other. This was real. But if you have to think in italics on your wedding day, well, it probably isn’t a good sign.
Without a free house to live in, Clay and I couldn’t afford to stay in Richmond Hills or buy anything in Savannah.
This was the first shock to my system. In New England, master carpenters could earn a fortune.
But Clay’s specialty was furniture, and in the South, where there were so many massive furniture manufacturers, the field paid less.
And so, after our grace period of a week, we moved to Augusta.
Our new house wasn’t Southern-style and didn’t have Southern charm.
It was a small, plain ranch on a street with similar homes.
Our next-door neighbor came over as we unloaded the U-Haul .
. . mostly my stuff and the furniture Clay had made.
“Hey, y’all!” he said cheerfully. “The wife sent some cookies over to say welcome. She’d come over herself, but Jesus wept, this weather!
Sweatier than the devil’s butthole, am I right? ”
“Tell me it’s a heat wave,” I said, offering my damp hand. My T-shirt was stuck to my back. In Savannah, there would have at least been a breeze from the river. Here . . . not so much.
“Sorry, ma’am,” he said. “You get used to it. Well, not really, but we say that so we don’t scare y’all away. You’re a Yankee? Don’t worry, we’ll overlook that! A person can’t help where they were born!”
I’d become used to Southerners telling me that it was only their graciousness that would force them to tolerate me (which I didn’t find all that gracious, to be honest).
But tolerated was the perfect word. The mothers of Mathilda’s classmates smiled and said hello and complimented me on everything—You’re as pretty as a peach!
I just love your hair. Is that a new dress?
Golly, Mathilda’s outfit is just precious!
—but it seemed like all the friend circles were closed.
Then again, I couldn’t blame the South .
. . I hadn’t made a new friend since, oh, seventh grade.
Paisley and Skylar had been pleasant acquaintances, but we didn’t stay in touch once I got married.
I had pals from college, but not true friends.
Study partners and classmates and some kids from the hacky sack team.
Nothing like the soul-deep friendship I’d had with the Core Four.
In Augusta, I had Clay and Clay alone. And Mathilda.
Almost immediately, I was slapped by the reality of being her stepmother.
The child didn’t speak to me for the first thirty-two days we lived together.
“Say good morning to Audrey, Mattie,” Clay would say.
“Go on, now. Don’t be rude. Say good morning.
Say it, Mathilda. Come on, sunshine, there’s no reason to be like this.
Do it for Daddy. Now. Right now. You’re making Audrey feel real bad. ”
Let your stepchild take the lead, the books had said. “Why don’t we let her come around on her own time?” I suggested. “You don’t have to say good morning, Mathilda. It’s okay.” She flipped her bowl of cereal onto the floor and stomped out of the room.
Encourage your stepchild to talk about her emotions. “How are you feeling about things, Mattie?” I’d ask. “It must be strange, all this change happening at once.”
She glared.
“Well, you can always come to me if you want to talk.”
She did not.