The Beach Quilt (6 page)

Cindy was in a very good mood. Joe had just gotten paid by one of his biggest clients—and on time at that!—putting them a bit ahead of the game, and the night before they had talked about using the money to replace the fridge and very possibly the oven. Both had been repaired more than once, and the warranties had long been out of effect. A new fridge and oven were hardly glamorous purchases, but Cindy was excited nevertheless.

Life was really pretty good. The girls seemed happy and were doing well in school. If the family didn't have a new car every two years and if they couldn't afford to take vacations very often (well, who needed them when you lived in such a pretty place?) and if putting the girls through college was going to take almost superhuman effort, so be it. Cindy and Joe had each other, a nice house, good kids, and steady jobs. And, soon, they would have new appliances!

Cindy gave the coffee table a final wipe with the polishing rag and left the living room for the kitchen to make a cup of tea.
Good old fridge,
she thought, taking the milk out of it. Whatever features came with their new one, the most important would always be the door on which Cindy could post photos.

She smiled as she looked at the picture of Cordelia and Sarah taken on the first day of kindergarten. Cordelia's mouth was wide open in laughter. Sarah stared directly at the camera, her mouth closed. They had made a funny little pair, Cordelia bubbly and always chattering away, Sarah pensive and quiet. Still, they seemed to thrive on what the other offered. Cordelia made Sarah laugh with her unconsciously dramatic personality. Sarah kept Cordelia from bumping into furniture and running out into the street without looking first for cars.

Cindy poured a bit of milk into her tea and took the cup to the table. The girls had been so good about letting Stevie tag along with them once she was mobile. But that stage hadn't lasted for long. Stevie had always been independent, even more so than Sarah. Though she made friends easily enough, she had never been terribly close to any of them. Even now, Stevie didn't have a best friend; she got along equally well with a group of three girls with whom she spent her free time. Cindy smiled. Correction. Stevie
did
have a best friend. The best friend had four legs and a tail and could leap onto the top of the bookcase in Sarah's room in a single bound. Cats really were pretty extraordinary, Cindy mused. She had never lived with one until the year Stevie was three and Joe had brought home from the local shelter a six-year-old orange tabby in need of love and attention. By the time Stevie was five, she was in complete charge of Orangey (the name had been her decision), and even when his kidneys began to fail a few years after that, Stevie had proved to have nursing talent well beyond her years. When Orangey died, Stevie had mourned, but within a month she had asked her father to drive her to the shelter. They had come home with Clarissa, that very pretty little tortoiseshell with the very big personality.

Stevie had never talked about what she wanted to be when she grew up, but Cindy thought she might become a veterinarian. She guessed that with people's obsessions with their pets, Stevie would eventually be financially secure.

Sarah, of course, would also be successful, whether she went into the law or nursing. There was never any doubt in Cindy's mind that her older daughter would do something important with her life. There was also never any doubt that both girls would marry men like their father, kind and decent and hardworking. Cindy hoped they would stay in Maine, if not in Yorktide itself, but her girls were smart and curious and creative. They might not find the perfect opportunities waiting just down the road. She would hate to live far away from her grandchildren and miss the small and special occasions of their growing up, but Sarah and Stevie would know what was best for their families.

Cindy shook her head at her own folly. What was the point of worrying about or trying to predict the future? The right now kept her busy enough.

“Hey, Cordelia!”

“Hi, Cassie!”

Cordelia loved the social aspect of school. She had gone only a few yards down the hall after leaving French class and already she had been greeted by three people. Really, the friendliness made any negatives seem not so bad after all. Even gym class was tolerable because she could sneak a commiserating chat with the other kids in the class for whom sports were boring, embarrassing, or downright impossible.

A harsh laugh alerted Cordelia to a knot of kids up ahead by a stand of lockers. She knew it meant trouble even before she identified one of the kids as Corey Bohan, a notorious bully who, unlike a lot of male bullies, was usually smart enough not to get caught. “Not this time,” Cordelia muttered under her breath as she strode toward the group.

As she grew closer, she saw the object of Corey's unwanted attentions, a freshman named Martin something or other.
Poor kid,
Cordelia thought. He had bully magnet written all over him, from his too skinny arms to his bad haircut (clearly his mom or dad had done it), from his mouth full of braces to his too short pants.

“Hey, Martin!” she said loudly, causing both Martin and his would-be tormentor to jump. “I was looking for you. I need help with my laptop. Do you have some time to look at it now?”

Martin smiled gratefully and nodded. Corey (
and really,
Cordelia thought,
he could use a better haircut, too, not to mention a shower
) glared at her for a moment, and then abruptly walked off. His cohorts trailed behind him, muttering empty threats.
Idiot,
Cordelia thought. She would bet money that Corey would be spending his adult life stuck in some minimum wage job he would barely be smart enough to keep.

“Great,” she said to Martin. “Let's go.”

Cordelia led Martin toward the library. Fact was she really did need some IT help, but even if she hadn't, she would have lied to get Martin safely out of a bad situation. Her father had talked about something called “moral proximity” one night at dinner, and it had really struck a chord. It was the idea that when you were faced with someone in need of help, you had a moral obligation to help them simply because you were there and a witness to the situation. Well, her father had put it more eloquently, but Cordelia didn't need to talk about it, just to put the idea into action. She hoped that if someday she were witness to something really horrific, like what those people at the Boston Marathon had experienced, seeing people blown apart just feet away, she would have the courage to act.

Martin worked his magic on Cordelia's computer and left the library blushing with the pleasure of an accomplishment recognized and valued. Cordelia followed soon after and headed for her final class of the day. Along the way, she kept her eye out for her father.

She hardly ever saw him during the day, but on occasion they would catch each other's eyes across a crowded hallway. Seeing him always made Cordelia smile. Her father was a great guy; even the kids who regularly got in trouble thought so. Well, if they thought otherwise, they weren't telling her, but Cordelia knew that his methods of correction (he didn't like the word
punishment
) were fair and most often they worked.

Cordelia stopped outside the door to geometry class. It most definitely was
not
her favorite subject. Still, there were only four and a half months left of school and then no more sine and cosine and problematic angles and complicated formulas. Sure, she would probably have to work at The Busy Bee during the summer, but not every day. There were far worse places to work, but she kind of enjoyed grumbling about it anyway. Her mom knew she was only kidding around.

And then, senior year would begin, and it would be so much fun. She and Sarah had been looking forward to it since the start of junior year. Well, it was mostly Cordelia who had been psyched about the parties and the prom and the overnight trip the class would take to Augusta. Sarah was much more subdued a person. She was the sort who calmly took each day as it came, although she was also the sort to plan ahead and to always have a few Band-Aids in her backpack “just in case.” In short, of the two, Sarah was the more mature one; everybody could see that.

“And now
I've
got to be mature,” Cordelia murmured, “and go inside!”

Cordelia survived the class, as she knew of course that she would, and left the building with a spring in her step.
Wow,
she thought.
Look at that!
The sun was actually shining through the gray cloud cover. Okay, it wasn't as if you could feel its warmth, but there it was, if you looked hard enough. Summer was still a very long way off, but nevertheless, Cordelia's spirits lifted. Better times were coming, and by better, she meant warmer and brighter weather and some awesome new clothes to go with it.

“Hey, Cordelia!”

“Hi, Thomas!”

Cordelia waved and headed toward the waiting bus.

Cindy and Joe and Sarah were in the kitchen, seated around the table. Stevie had gone to a friend's house after dinner to watch a movie. It was only six thirty, but it had been dark since four. The house felt very quiet.

Sarah noted that her parents looked tired. Her mom had been at the quilt shop most of the day, cleaning for the reopening. Her dad never took a day off, unless he was really sick, and as far as Sarah could remember that had happened only once. He had even gone back to work hours after he had broken his wrist a few years back.

She took a steadying breath. This was the hardest thing she would ever have to do. By comparison, telling Justin that she was pregnant had been a breeze. And that was because she truly loved her parents. She respected them. She cared what they thought of her, far more than she cared what Justin thought of her. What Justin
had
thought of her, once upon a time.

Her mother spoke. “You said you wanted to tell us something.”

“Yes.” Sarah squeezed her hands together in her lap. She looked at her mother; she couldn't bear to look at her father. “I'm going to have a baby,” she said.

Neither parent said anything. There was a dull and uncomprehending look on her mother's face. At least, that's how Sarah read her expression. She still couldn't look at her father.

“I mean,” she went on, “that I'm pregnant.”

Her mother twitched, as if a switch had been thrown, bringing her back to life. “I know what you mean,” she snapped. Then she slumped a bit in her chair. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have . . . oh, God, Sarah, are you sure?”

Sarah nodded. “Yes,” she said. “I took a test.”

Her mother leaned forward. “A test? Only one? So that means—”

“No. I mean, I know. I'm sure. I just am.”

For what seemed like an eternity, no one moved or said a word. Finally, Sarah's father shifted in his chair and her mother put her hand to her chest as if to calm the beating of her heart.

Sarah felt tears spring to her eyes. “I'm so sorry,” she cried. “I don't know what else to say. Except, please, please forgive me.”

“Now, enough of that,” her father said, in what Sarah thought was a remarkably even tone. She glanced quickly at him, and he gave her the ghost of a smile.

“Is the . . . is Justin the father?” her mother asked.

Sarah nodded. “Yes. I told him a few days ago.”

“And? What did he say?”

“He offered to marry me.”

“Oh, Lord!”

“Don't worry, Mom,” Sarah said hastily. “I said no. I knew he really didn't mean it. And I don't want to be married to him, either. And he offered to help pay for an abortion, but I told him I was going to have the baby.”

Sarah glanced again at her father. His lips were now compressed into a fine thin line.

“Where do you stand with him now?” her mother asked.

Sarah looked down at her hands, folded in her lap. “Nowhere, I guess. We're not together, if that's what you mean.”

“So he's walking away?”

Her father's voice was tight now. Sarah was surprised he hadn't burst out with a violent stream of abuse against Justin. Not that she had ever seen her father lose his temper, not even when another driver cut him off or when a client cheated him out of part of his fee. But this was something far worse.

“He said he would be there for me.” Sarah winced at the lie. That wasn't what he had said, not really.

“What does that mean, exactly?” her mother asked.

“I don't know.”
But that's a lie, too,
Sarah thought. She knew very well what it meant.

There was another terribly uncomfortable silence until finally, her father spoke. “Well, that's that,” he said. “Cindy, you get Sarah to a doctor. We've got a lot of planning to do, what with a new baby coming along.”

He got up from his seat and leaned down to hug Sarah where she sat hunched beside him. Then he squeezed his wife's shoulder and left the kitchen.

The worst,
Sarah thought, as a shudder of relief ran through her,
is over.

Or else, it had only just begun.

How in heaven's name did a person accumulate so much stuff? Adelaide sighed and tapped the stack of papers that would go into the recycling bin. Even though she straightened her desk several times a week, there always seemed to be a handful of unwanted and unnecessary—well, garbage.

But this advertisement for a college loan program could stay. She and Jack had been saving since Cordelia was born, but there was never any harm in reevaluating their game plan. Adelaide hoped that the Bauers were being as proactive as she and Jack were with Sarah's education fund. But it wasn't something she could ask without sounding as if she were criticizing.

Anyway, figuring out how to fund a college education sometimes felt like learning an exotic and very slippery language. Adelaide doubted anyone could really tell what would happen. Sarah, for example, had the better grades, though Cordelia, with her involvement with the school newspaper (she wrote the weekly social column) and her participation in the Teens and Elders program (once every two weeks a group of kids were bused to a local home for seniors where they read to the residents or played cards or simply talked), might be considered more well-rounded and might therefore be more eligible for scholarships. Cordelia's family had more money than Sarah's; Sarah might be considered more eligible for financial aid. But who knew? They would just have to wait and see which girl was awarded what opportunities.
One thing is certain,
Adelaide thought with a smile.
Neither girl is ever going to get an athletic scholarship!

Adelaide looked at the framed photo of the girls on the shelf over her desk. Next to it sat a photo of Cindy and Adelaide at The Busy Bee, on the occasion of the store's fifth anniversary.
Hmmm,
Adelaide thought. Maybe the four of them—or the five of them if Stevie were interested—could take a girls' excursion before the summer season hit hard, and Adelaide and Cindy would be glued to the shop. Just a day trip, maybe to the Farnsworth Art Museum or to the Winslow Homer Studio in Prouts Neck, or even just up to Portland. They could easily spend a full day in the city, visiting the museum, shopping, taking a tour of the Longfellow House, and having lunch somewhere fun. There was a good French-style bistro she had read about, though it might be a bit too pricey for Cindy and her girls.
Well,
Adelaide thought,
there is nothing wrong with fish and chips!

The thought of fish (if not chips) brought to mind Sarah's boyfriend, Justin.
He
hadn't gone to college. In fact, to hear Cordelia talk, he had barely graduated high school. There was certainly no love lost between Cordelia and Justin Morrow. She called him the Idiot.

“Now, Cordelia. Why would Sarah go out with an idiot?” Adelaide remembered asking.

Cordelia had just shrugged. “Don't ask me. But she is.”

True, the relationship was a bit curious, but Sarah seemed happy, so she must be getting something from all the time she spent with Justin. Sarah wasn't the sort to waste her time with someone entirely lacking in merit.

Yes, Adelaide thought, she would suggest to Cindy that the five of them take a day trip some Saturday. And if Saturday was the day Sarah usually spent with Justin, well, it wouldn't kill her to change her plans this once. Boys and men could wait.

Adelaide hefted the stack of wastepaper she had gathered and headed down to the basement, where the recycling bins lived.