The Traveling Tea Shop (27 page)

“Don’t come near me!” Ravenna howls as I catch up with her in the middle of a field.

“I have to talk to you about this!”

“It’s not bad enough that you let me make a fool of myself, but then you have to get it on with him! Oh my god!”

Suddenly I realize just how grotesque this must seem. To me, Ravenna was never a reason to hold back because she was his sister. But is that really an excuse? Is this really something I should have been indulging in while I was working? It just seemed like the most marvelously irresistible perk. Until now. Now I’m utterly disgusted with myself.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Really?” she scoffs. “How long has this been going on?”

“It was just one moment yesterday, that’s—”

“We both kissed him on the same day? Gross!
Gross!
”

I don’t know what to say. I just feel so tacky.

Ravenna continues to pace like a wild cat while I descend into a slump of shame.

Finally she stops dead in front of me.

“You know your sister is here.”

“What?” I turn cold.

“She’s here at the hotel. I wasn’t supposed to tell you, but I’m not as big on the secrets and lies as the rest of you.”

“H-how is that even possible?”

“She flew in this morning.”

I feel my breathing accelerate. My god. This is all happening too fast.

“Takes the wind out of your sails, doesn’t it?” Ravenna taunts.

I nod.

“So now it’s your turn.”

She goes to turn on her heel but the sound of my world crashing stalls her.

“I can’t do it!” I cry. “I can’t face her.”

“You have to. I had to.”

“I can’t!” I whimper. “I can’t feel all that pain again.”

My face falls into my hands. Suddenly there is no more holding back the emotion; it has to come out, full force, like a gushing, roaring eruption from the very core of me. And then, somewhere in the midst of the chugging tears and gasps for breath, these words escape me: “
I want my mum back!
”

Then they come again, “
I just want her back
.” And my heart splits open.

“Ravenna!” Pamela is calling to her daughter from the gate.

But she doesn’t move.

“You should go.” My breath catches as I try to speak. “And I don’t blame you for being angry with me. I would despise me in your shoes. I’d hate everybody.”

“Ravenna!” Pamela calls again.

“Wait there.”

As Ravenna hurries away, I let it all stream out of me, surrendering to the swirling, engulfing pain.

“She’s never coming back,” a voice in my head taunts me. “You’re never going to see your mother again.”

My face is dripping faster than I can wipe away the fluids, when suddenly assistance arrives in the form of a pink husky tongue.

“Mitten!” I can’t help but laugh at his fervent attempt to clean me up.

And then I realize that Ravenna is standing beside me.

“He did a good job with me last night,” she says. “I thought you might want a turn.”

Her expression is different now. Her eyes are no longer lasers trying to destroy me; she actually looks concerned.

“This is so backward!” I gasp as I try to calm the pup, my voice still juddering and jerking. “I’m supposed to be comforting you.”

“I made you cry.”

“It’s not you, it’s—”

“She’s not really here. Your sister. I just said that so you’d know how it feels to get sideswiped.”

“What?”

“Krista told me about your situation last night. I think she was using it as an example of a bigger scale of forgiveness.”

My hand goes to my chest. “I thought I was going to have a panic attack.”

“You kind of did.”

I sit back on my heels and shake my head. “I don’t think there’s any hope for me. I thought I might be ready to face her, but obviously I’m not.”

“Not today. But you might be in a week or two.”

“I don’t know,” I sniff. “How am I ever going to look at her and not think of my mother?”

“I wish I could just trade you mine.”

“Don’t say that! You don’t mean it.”

She looks back over at Pamela. “No. I probably don’t. I’d better go and face her.”

I watch the pair of them heading back toward the hotel and then hang my head. I have not handled this whole thing well. What was I thinking with Harvey?

“Laurie?”

Oh god, that’s him now.

He’s standing at a cautious distance.

“Hi.”

“Are you okay?”

I nod, wiping under my eyes as I scramble to my feet. “I think it’s best we keep a bit of distance between each other for a while.”

“We haven’t done anything wrong, you know that?”

I sigh. “Well, I don’t know. I was supposed to be working, not . . . Anyway. I can’t bear to hurt Ravenna any more than I already have, so . . .”

He nods. “I was thinking, I should probably go. At least that way she won’t be wondering if we’re meeting up behind her back.”

Though it makes sense, I definitely feel a wrench at the thought of him leaving.

“I’ll most likely go on to Newport, firm up the arrangements with Gracie’s crew.”

“Good idea.” I can’t even look at him.

“I hate to leave you like this.”

“I’m fine,” I force a smile, ignoring my urge to run to him and burrow into his chest. “I have Krista. And Mitten here.”

“He does look like pretty good company,” he smiles.

“He’s the best.”

“Okay. Well. You take care.”

I nod, unable to speak.

Once I’m sure he’s out of sight, I experience another flow of tears. My heart hurts so badly right now.

I think of all the people who have stood in this field, spinning around with their arms flung wide, whereas I just want to lie down until snowfall.

I may well have done that very thing, had Krista not sent me a text to say that she’s nearly done and to meet me in our room.

Suddenly I feel like I have a home to go to.

•   •   •

Mitten pulls me all the way there, ever eager to race ahead, even when there is no sled to pull.

The room we’re sharing has a rustic Austrian design—pine beams and bedheads and a large booth embedded in the bay window, complete with a table I can set for dinner. I go ahead and order a pair of Wiener Schnitzels and Apfelstrudels so Krista will have some sustenance as soon as she gets in.

Here she is now.

As I open the door, she pretends to be wheezing her last breath, dragging herself in on her hands and knees.

“Helluva day?” I chuckle.

“I don’t know how therapists do it! I’m wrung out!”

“How was it going with Ravenna and Pamela?”

Krista pulls a face, flipping onto her back and letting Mitten tread on her splayed-out hair. “It’s messy, as you would expect. I think they’re going to be at it for most of the night. I just had to leave them to it.”

“Absolutely, you’ve done more than your fair share.”

“Do I smell food?”

“And wine,” I confirm.

“Praise be!” She jumps back to her feet. And then stops as she comes level with my face. “You’ve been crying!”

I nod. “The noisiest kind.”

“Oh honey!” She pulls me into a hug. “I’m here now. You can tell me all about it.”

“Like you haven’t dealt with enough today already.”

“Oh nonsense. I’ve always got time for you.”

And so we hole up in our booth, chatting and sipping Riesling until it’s time for Mitten’s last wee of the day.

•   •   •

It’s so tranquil in the moonlight. So still. All I can hear is the sound of Mitten snuffling at the shrubbery.

“You’re going to get culture shock when you go back to New York,” Krista notes.

My heart feels a little heavy at the prospect. I don’t feel ready for this journey to be over.

“I’m just sorry you didn’t get to meet Harvey properly.”

“Oh, I saw enough of him to know he’s the real deal.”

I look up at her. “He is, isn’t he?”

“Hey, don’t give up on that working out, you said he wants to see you again.”

“I know, but it feels a bit unseemly, all things considered. I mean, it’s not like we could have a relationship without Pamela and Charles knowing, which of course in turn means Ravenna.”

“Listen, she knows you’re way overdue for a good man. She may give you her blessing yet.”

“My lovely optimist!” I say, linking arms with my best friend as we stroll onward.

“She said it herself,” Krista shrugs, “she wants to be a better person.”

I nod, not entirely convinced it would stretch that far.

“I meant to ask you, did Eon come up while you were together?”

“He did,” Krista shudders. “But I managed to hold her off calling him, playing on the fact that she’d so recently been propelling herself at another man. Of course he’s flipping out that he hasn’t spoken to her, and posting all kinds of pictures of himself with super-skinny models on Facebook . . .”

“Classy.”

“He’s such an idiot. I know she doesn’t want to go back to him, she’s just in a bit of turmoil at the moment.”

“I really hope she doesn’t.”

Krista stifles a yawn, which in turn triggers one in me, and then Mitten gives the most comically exaggerated jaw stretch confirming, quite categorically, that it’s time for bed.

“Tomorrow is a new day,” I say as we head back.

When I first wake up, it seems as if all is well. The sky is a soaring blue, I’m here with Krista and Mitten, we have tickets to the von Trapp History Tour and breakfast is an extensive buffet.

“Best meal of the day!” Krista cheers as we begin lifting assorted metal lids, wafting at the resulting steam and peering within. “I seriously think I could live off breakfast foods for the rest of my life—I mean, you’ve got your bacon and sausages and eggs and pancakes and waffles and oatmeal and cereal and yogurts and fruits and bagels and pastries and muffins—”

“And no salad or vegetables.”

“Well, there’s mushrooms and tomatoes. I love a cooked tomato.”

I’m slightly on edge, expecting the others to walk in at any moment, but so far we’re safe, tucked in a far nook by the window overlooking those benevolent mountains.

“Plus look at the breakfast drinks—coffee, tea, champagne for your Bucks Fizz or Mimosa, every kind of fruit juice and maybe some kind of smoothie—”

“Okay, I’m convinced!” I laugh. “But I think that’s quite enough coffee for you.” I move her cup to the far side of the table.

She expels a long sigh. “That was good.”

I too set down my napkin, trying to sound casual as I say, “I wonder how everyone is doing today?”

“Mmm, I wonder. Do you think all this will affect their plans to fly back to London tomorrow?”

“Good point. I don’t know.”

“I can’t see Gracie wanting to go back at all.”

“I agree,” I sigh. “She’s found a new home. A new life.”

I can’t help but feel a pang of envy.

Krista checks her watch. “Come on, it’s time for our tour.”

•   •   •

We congregate in a barnlike building on the grounds, at least forty guests eager to learn the behind-the-scenes secrets of the story that inspired
The Sound of Music.

“This is so perfect!” Krista enthuses as she takes out her notebook. “You know we’re running a Salzburg guide to tie-in with the fiftieth anniversary next year? This should give us some nice tidbits!”

I have to say the insider insights are a welcome distraction. The one that surprises me the most is that it was Maria, with her austere convent upbringing, who was the strict one, not the Captain! But the biggest gasp from the group comes when we learn that Maria signed away the film rights to her autobiography to a German producer for a modest sum, who then sold them on to Broadway and Hollywood. The von Trapps never got a cut of the blockbuster’s profits. Krista and I are just speculating how many millions they missed out on, when two latecomers join the group: Pamela and Ravenna.

“Oh no!” I hiss at Krista, burying my head. “I think we should go. I don’t want them to feel uncomfortable.”

“It’s fine,” Krista dismisses my concern. “If they are uncomfortable they can leave. We were here first.”

“Since when did you get so assertive?” I blink back at her.

“It’s dealing with the dogs all day—on the sled you have to let them know who’s boss.”

“But that’s just it, I’m not the boss here.”

“Sssssh!”

Great, now we’ve peeved the people next to us. Perhaps if I just act as if I haven’t noticed them?

It doesn’t help that the guide is now leading us to the family burial plot, even if it is an exceptionally pretty, peaceful, flower-entwined area of the garden. As the voices become a distant mumble, I think of standing beside Mum’s headstone, setting her favorite Gerbera daisies in the vase, and for the first time ever I wish that Jessica was standing beside me. And then my eyes stray to Pamela and Ravenna. Standing together, even after all they’ve been through. I don’t know if it’s because I got my meltdown out of my system yesterday, but suddenly I feel a little braver, a little more hopeful . . . Could I see Jess? Could I forgive her? Could we be close again?

“Laurie? Are you coming?” Krista chivvies me along, back into the hotel. Here we’re invited to watch a short documentary with Maria von Trapp. Gray hair braided atop her head, she is utterly disarming in her honesty, confessing that when the Captain proposed to her in real life, she burst into tears and ran all the way back to the convent!

“Not quite the reaction he was going for,” Krista chuckles. And then I feel her nails digging into my arm. “Oh my gosh—look at the von Trapp we got!”

At the end of every tour, an authentic member of the von Trapp family appears to answer questions and sign autographs. We get Sam von Trapp, Maria’s grandson, who just happens to be a former ski instructor and Ralph Lauren model.

“I’m going to see if he’ll do an interview for our ‘Man of the World’ page.”

“Good idea!” I’m just about to join Krista in the queue when Pamela approaches.

Here we go.

“I just wanted to talk to you about the schedule for the end of the trip.”

I’m quick to react. “Yes, of course. There’s no problem with me finding my own way home. Krista can drop me at the nearest train station and I’ll just head on back to New York and tie up all the ends from there.”

“Oh no, that’s not what I meant,” she reaches for my hand. “We still need you for the fund-raiser in Newport.”

“The fund-raiser?”

“Yes, we’re going ahead with your idea for the High Tea on the High Seas. Harvey is there making the arrangements now.”

“About Harvey,” I gulp awkwardly. “I feel I should apologize to you for being so horribly unprofessional—”

“Oh please,” she cuts me off. “As if we haven’t all gone a little astray on this trip. I mean, compared to my mother and me, you’ve been positively chaste.”

I give a little snuffle. “Thank you, for being so understanding.”

“Not at all. So, what I was going to say was, I really want to get back to Mum as soon as possible, and Charles says if we leave now we can get to Newport for happy hour. I know this isn’t quite what we had on the schedule—”

“That’s fine,” I assure her. “I happen to be very familiar with the accommodation situation in Newport, so I can make those arrangements right now.”

“Great,” she chirps. “We can all go and pack and see you back at the bus in an hour?”

“I can do that, if you’re sure Ravenna won’t mind me being on board.”

“It’s a big bus, it’ll be fine. I’m just sorry to cut short your time with Krista.”

She’s got me there. For a moment I wonder about asking Krista to come with us—we could do with an extra pair of hands, and the fund-raiser was her idea, after all—but she and Jacques have a big event at the farm this weekend, so she needs to get back.

“We’ll see each other very soon anyway,” she says, “what with Jessica’s visit on the cards.”

“Yes,” I reply. Though I experience a queasy dip at the prospect, Krista’s presence is reassuring. Even if I do fall apart, I have someone to hold on to, someone who will get me through. “It’s going to be okay, isn’t it?”

“It really is. I’ll make sure of that. And as far as this place goes,” Krista gives a fond look back at the lodge, “maybe we’ll come back here again in the autumn or when it’s all fireside-cozy with snow.”

“That would be lovely,” I sigh.

It’s always a wrench leaving Krista, always a bit stomach-churningly sentimental. “You’re the best,” I say as we share our final hug good-bye. “I couldn’t have got through any of this without you.”

“We’re a good team,” she confirms. “Now go and savor every last moment of this trip. Fill your lungs with sea air!”

She always knows the right thing to say—suddenly I can’t wait to get back to Newport . . .