2 Months 'Til Mrs. (2 'Til Series) (6 page)

“So what, Mom? Bitchy? Does that cover it?” she
flared.

“Well, I wasn’t going to be so blunt. But yes.”

Her mouth was an “o” of justified indignation. Her
mother had just called her a bitch, of course without having to actually say
the offensive word.

“I just think it would be nice for the family. And if
you are going to be around more now… which is wonderful,” her mother quickly
added, “then I think you need to let down that wall and be friendly.”

She sulked, eyeing the scene moving past beyond the
window. A flurry of white had begun to fall again, a soft snow, hardly the kind
to incapacitate anyone, and yet she was stuck—might as well have been a
blizzard falling in her mind. She was always going to be poor lonely Catherine,
disappointment of the Hemmings clan.

Sixteen hours into the New Year and she was coming
down with a bad case of the blahs. The year she met Joel “Fynn” Trager was over
and she had nothing to show for it but a shamefully high number of friskings at
the airport—more people had touched her in more places this year than in all
her life prior. Oh, and there was that whole
love
thing… she’d had that
much. But not anymore. No more jet lag or baggage or sexy hellos or tearful
goodbyes. It had all simply proven too much—stretched too thin. The single life
in NYC was so much easier… and she would be close to her friends and her
family….

“Elizabeth!” her father called through the house.

“I think she’s in the mudroom, Dad,” Catherine
offered, hoping he would continue his search on foot rather than hollering her
name from the middle of the foyer. She was starting to understand why her
mother used to get so annoyed when she did the same thing to get Connor to come
down for dinner, admonishing her,
If I wanted to yell him down the stairs I
could have done it myself.

Catherine settled herself back into the living room couch
and heaved a sigh of massive proportions, fighting the urge to put her feet on
the coffee table, even though they were shoeless, because tables were tables
and feet were exclusively made for the floor. Of course to someone who
never
put her feet up, like Elizabeth Hemmings who was always busy-busy-busy,
such a policy would seem like no kind of trouble at all. But to the rest of the
population…. No wonder her dad had fought to have his own personal recliner in
every room in the house.

She’d made it through the first day of a brand new year.
Last night she’d had a sneaking suspicion she would have fallen into a million
little pieces by now, but here she was, exhausted but whole. And that detour to
Connor and Lacey’s this afternoon had actually served her well. Her tiny niece
had helped put things into perspective. Kids were absolutely exhausting. She
shouldn’t be jealous of the women around her who were having babies; she should
feel sorry for them. Just being an aunt sapped all her strength. And she was
Nell’s godmother too. She was everything but a mother herself these days. In
fact, she had so many new hats to wear this year that something was going to
have to give, for her sanity. If that thing had to be her position as
girlfriend and lover to Fynn, then so be it, she reasoned.

Besides, with Fynn came Cara.

He had committed to Cara first. He’d promised Renée
that he would be there for her daughter when she passed. Catherine had known
about this before they even started dating, and it wasn’t fair of her to string
him along if she wasn’t committed to helping raise the little girl. The fact
that the babies in her midst these days made her skittish might be a sign. Just
like the fact that babies got fidgety in her arms was a sign. Even if she
picked up a sleeping baby, within moments they were squirming and then waking
and then
screaming
with horror at her embrace. Cara certainly deserved
better than a terror-inducing mother figure. Not that Cara was a baby. And she
had never screamed in Catherine’s presence. She actually giggled a lot. Of
course Cara was five now and able to do a lot more than babies could do…. Catherine
even taught her how to ride a bike when no one else could. And Cara liked to
hold Catherine’s hand in the parking lot, and help her carry groceries into the
house. And Cara trusted her with all her favorite toys and liked her to read
bedtime stories—

“I can’t believe someone would toss their dirty shoes
in our hedges. What is this neighborhood coming to?” Elizabeth ranted, marching
through the house, into the foyer, and then up the stairs, probably carrying a
load of laundry to put away.

“I hardly think it’s a sign that the neighborhood is
going downhill—”

“It’s vandalism, William. Pure and simple.” Catherine
heard the telltale sounds of bureau drawers being slammed shut, punctuating her
mother’s words. Elizabeth Hemmings did some of her most efficient work while
she was fussing about something or other.

“It’s a prank,” her father said.

“Shoes in the bushes? I’ve never heard of that one.
Shoes over power lines, yes. Dog crap in a flaming paper sack, yes. But dog
crap
on
shoes
in
the bushes?” she pointed out dubiously.

Catherine gulped. She’d had no intention of reclaiming
the poop shoes from the bushes to wear or even
take
back to New York
with her. She’d had every intention of stealing her mother’s albeit sensible
but extremely comfortable shoes that she’d worn all day. Worst case, she could
always just drive back in her stocking feet (also her mother’s). As long as she
peed right before she left she shouldn’t have to stop along the way—even
she
drew the line at walking into a public restroom without a rigid sole between
her feet and the floor.  

She stared up at the ceiling, listening to the sounds
of her parents chuckling, her mother’s rant turning into a joking sparring
match. That was what she wanted in life. Someone she could rant at or to and
then turn around and joke with. All without upsetting the balance of the
universe….

That was what she’d found in Fynn.

That was what she’d thrown away.

All the other stuff was the easy part. Finding that
person who meshed with you completely was the important thing.

*****

“So, Catherine, what are your plans for the rest of—”

Uncle Dick, who was never too far away to come for a
meal, dropped his knife at that moment, cutting off Elizabeth’s question and
shifting her focus to the potential damages.

Your life?
Catherine filled in the blank,
wondering if her mother would be so bold—no, subtly lethal was more her thing.

While her mother focused on the butter smeared on her
newest tablecloth, Catherine eyed the sad dinner buffet of party leftovers
spread out before them. It seemed that no amount of stuffed mushroom caps and prime
rib, or turkey and Mom’s Victorian potatoes was going to pull her out of her
funk. She looked to the pies and cakes on the credenza and failed to believe
any of those would help either, though she was pretty certain she would give
them a try anyway.

Elizabeth had left the dining room and returned again,
administering a homemade detergent paste treatment to the butter stain before
sitting back in her seat, reasonably at ease. Her eyes occasionally wandered
back to the blemish speculatively, but at least she picked up her fork again.

“Well, now,” she said, slightly breathless from the
intensity of laundering, “what are your plans for the rest of the weekend?”

First it was relief that her mother wasn’t digging too
deep, but then she recognized this for what it was—a baited trap set before
her. “I have to get back to the city. I have some things to take care of before
going back to work on Monday.” Evasive and noncommittal.

Her mother waited, staring at her, testing her
willpower before saying anything further. “Well, I just wanted to say that the
church is having a New Year’s brunch after the late service tomorrow. I thought
it would be perfect for you since you like to sleep in.”

Invite and slam all in one nice tidy package. “Sounds wonderful,
but I really need to be on the road first thing if I am going to have time to
get… those things done… before Monday.” She had controlled her tone well
enough, but stumbling over
what
she had to do was pretty transparent.

“That’s too bad,” Elizabeth said, shaking her head sadly.
She quickly brightened, though. “Why don’t we go to the early service instead
and have brunch at the diner before you leave?” Like this would make everybody
happy—it was about saving her daughter’s soul here.

“It would probably be better if I left tonight
actually,” she eked out, knowing that now she was entirely transparent, counter-stepping
her mother at every turn, too quickly and too generally for her own good.

“She doesn’t want to hang with the fogeys, Elizabeth,”
her father said helpfully, winking at his daughter.

“I was just trying to be polite. I know she would
rather be out with people her own age, but seeing as how—would anyone like
dessert?” Elizabeth redirected quickly, perfunctorily getting up from her seat
and stacking the dinner dishes whether people were finished eating or not. When
she snatched Uncle Dick’s he was in mid-poke of a mushroom cap, and it
skittered off the plate and onto the table and then to the floor where he dove
for it. Catherine had never seen him move so quickly, not even when some kid
was trespassing on his lawn.

Her mother completely ignored her guest, intent on
getting into the kitchen to begin the cleanup.

“I don’t see what the big deal is around here,” Uncle Dick
said from under the table. “So she’s a lesbian. Most old maids are lesbians;
it’s always been that way ever since I can remember.” He got up off of all
fours a lot slower than he’d gone down, popping the mushroom into his mouth as he
resettled himself in his seat.

Catherine heard her father’s jaw hit the table, or
maybe she imagined it, but when she looked his way his eyes were bugged out and
his mouth was definitely hanging open. She gave him a halfhearted,
one-shouldered shrug of embarrassment. Obviously he’d missed out on all the fun
gossip last night.

“I thought you were—I mean, Fynn was a—what the hell
did I miss?”

“Nothing Dad,” she said grimly, wishing now that she’d
just made an announcement to the whole party last night, a categorical denial…
or better yet, that she’d gagged her Aunt Judy and shoved her in the hall
closet through the New Year.

“It doesn’t sound like nothing.”

“It was Judy, dear, doing what Judy does best,”
Elizabeth called over the sound of the faucet in the kitchen.

“Giving me a heart attack?” he hollered back.

Elizabeth came into the room, drying her hands on a
dishtowel and slinging it over her shoulder in order to take a load of glasses
into the kitchen. “She’s harmless.”

“She’s a menace.”

“She’s my sister,” Elizabeth cautioned.

“She’s still a pain in my ass.”

“Can you blame her for wondering… really?”

“Mother!” Catherine gasped.

“I’ve never been one to lie to you and I am not going
to start now. The fact that you haven’t settled down after
so much dating
—”

“I haven’t dated
that
much,” she huffed.

Elizabeth leveled a look of bemusement at that
admonition.

“Compared to you, the Pope has dated a lot,” Catherine
countered before her mother could say anything.

“Catherine Marie Hemmings!” Elizabeth scolded,
reaching for the glass Uncle Dick was actively drinking from and causing iced
tea to dribble onto the tablecloth. She stormed out of the room with the
glasses and within moments was back again, yanking the stained tablecloth out
from under the last of the table settings—bread basket, salt and pepper
shakers, elbows, and all. Like a magician, she did it with a flick of the wrist
that left nothing upset.

Catherine slumped in her seat like a punished child.
This
can’t be all there is for me.

As her mother came back with a stack of dessert
plates, she got up abruptly and headed for the bathroom, ignoring the worried
questions from behind her. She probably looked sick. She certainly felt sick.
Lovesick.

She locked the door and turned on the light, her heart
pounding dangerously in her chest.
I can’t do this for the rest of my life.
I can’t do this the rest of the decade!
She peered closely at her
reflection.
You love Fynn. You know he loves you. You can’t throw it all
away because of distance. You had something good. It was working. The only
thing wrong about it was you being a mental misfit.

Grabbing her phone out of her pocket, she tried to
steady herself before she did something rash all over again. Twice in two days.
She looked at the screen, hoping to find that she had missed a call—his call. But
if anyone had a move to make it was her—
unless he’s relieved to be done with
me.

She highlighted his name, pressing it before her
irrational and high-strung and stubborn self could stop her. The phone rang on
the other end, but it was digitized Fynn who cut in on the line, telling her he
would return her call when he got around to it—
which would probably be never
.
She had been remotely prepared to have this conversation (as prepared as
possible in sixty seconds’ time), but by no stretch of the imagination had she
considered what to say if she had to leave a message. What could she say to his
voice mail? How far could she go in explaining herself… or begging—
should I
be begging?

“Shit!” she gasped, hitting the end button with force,
cutting off the open line.
Oh my God, please tell me I didn’t just do that!
This
was exactly the way her whole “calling boys” act had started back in middle
school. Of course back then she’d had a corded phone that she would slam down
into the cradle whenever someone’s mother answered, and sometimes even when the
boy himself answered. And back then she didn’t usually swear before hanging up…
did I really do that?

She looked at her mirror-self who was white as a
sheet. She hadn’t meant to prank him. In fact she was trying to be mature and
honest and absolutely clear with him. She was going to fall on her sword for
him, taking the point right in her gut.
Now he’s going to think I am even more
insane, cell-stalking him.

“Are you okay in there?” her mother called from the
other side of the door.

“I’m fine,” she choked out.

“Uncle Dick needs to use the bathroom, so you might
want to light a match when you’re done. They’re in the vanity drawer, way in
back,” Elizabeth offered helpfully.

“I wasn’t—” But Catherine stopped herself. She didn’t
want her mother to know what she’d actually been doing in here. “Okay,” she
said shakily.