Chapter 52 Before
BEFORE
IT IS THEIR FOURTH book club meeting, before Hope has revealed who she really is.
They’ve finished reading The Grapes of Wrath (Hope’s choice, because she’d never read it and there might be a remake of it coming up that will be absolute Oscar bait).
The others don’t know that she has an ulterior motive.
They think she’s the kind of person who reads classics for fun, apparently.
Their lovely faces are up on the screen, and hers still shows the photo of her on a hike with her back to the camera.
Can she trust them?
She wants to trust them.
“I have to say,” Hope says, “I know I’m the one who picked this book, but I hated it.”
“You did?” Caro asks. “Why?”
“They made Rose of Sharon nurse a total stranger at the end,” Hope says. “Only a dude would write that.”
“She wanted to, though,” Ash says. “Or, like, Grandma wanted her to. And Grandma’s a woman. And Rose of Sharon did it because she wanted to save his life. I think it’s beautiful. It represents sacrifice.” She tilts her head. “But yeah, you’re right. Steinbeck was a guy, obviously.”
“It’s gratuitous.” Hope doesn’t know why she’s so furious about this, but she is.
Maybe because Rose of Sharon was the only decent female part, and now Hope doesn’t want to read for it because she’s not going to nurse an old man on camera, even if it might win her an Oscar.
“They could have, like, put it in a bottle,” Hope says. “Or a cup.”
“Oh my gosh,” Ash says. She is laughing so hard that Hope can see literal tears streaming down her face.
“I think what the book shows is true,” Caro says. “The women are what holds the center.”
She’s right. They’re both so wonderful that Hope decides she’s going to go ahead and do it.
This is getting ridiculous, and if her being who she is ends up being a dealbreaker, better to find that out sooner rather than later before she gets too attached.
(It’s too late. She’s already too attached.) The pandemic has been far, far easier on rich people and famous people (and Hope is both) than it has on about anyone and everyone else, but she is lonely as hell.
“Guys!” she says. “I think my camera is finally working.”
“Oh, wow!” Ash says. “Are we going to get to see you?”
Hope clicks the camera button so that her face now shows up on-screen.
They’ve only known her as Grace—that’s the name she used the first time they met and she’s logged in under that name every time since.
“Hey,” she says. There’s a quaver in her voice.
“I didn’t give you my real name to start with. I’m Hope.”
The response is gratifying. Ash gasps, covering her mouth, recognition immediate. Caro takes a couple of seconds longer, as if she knows who Hope is but can’t quite believe it. “Oh,” she says, finally, “it’s you.”
And even though Hope has heard this before, even though she knows the “It’s you” only means that they know who she is, somehow it sounds different this time. Somehow she feels like they really do recognize her, that they’ve known her and been waiting for her, all along.