Wedding Ring (34 page)

“Cute? At my age? That’s something.”

“Is this mid-life crisis?”

“I’m past mid-life, aren’t I? I don’t plan to live to be one hundred and twenty.”

“It’s such a change.”

Nancy settled herself across from her daughter. “I just got tired of trying so hard. Does that make sense to you?”

The last wasn’t a plea for understanding. Nancy seemed genuinely interested in Tessa’s response, whatever it was.

“It makes sense to me that you’d buy some cooler clothes and cut your hair, Mom. It’s hot as the dickens in this house. Makes me want to go chop all mine off.”

“Don’t you dare!”

Tessa grinned. “The old Nancy speaks.”

“No. I love your hair. It suits you perfectly. And you can put it up off your head and never fuss with it. I just got tired of fussing. Used to be, when your grandma was a girl, women of a certain age got to let themselves go. Well, I never got to, and I’m tired of the pretense.”

“You’re hardly sagging and bagging. You cut your hair and got some comfortable clothes. You look great. Dad’s going to think so, too. He called a little while ago to say he’s coming for the night so we can go birding early in the morning. He had to see a client in Harrisonburg for dinner, so he’s coming up afterward.”

Tessa expected the announcement to create a flurry of activity on her mother’s part, but Nancy didn’t even seem to register it.

“I feel great.” Nancy leaned back in the chair and stuck her legs out in front of her. “I used to get in trouble for doing this. Your grandmother had a fit if I lounged this way.”

“Gram had the time to notice something that trivial?”

“Not
my
mother. Billy’s. Grandmother Caroline.”

That made more sense to Tessa. Her father’s mother had been a tiny woman, bird-boned, long-necked and slender-legged, a swan with a similar temperament. She looked serene, even stately, but she could strike out with a vicious snap if anyone got too close. Tessa had learned early not to cross her grandmother and not to tell her anything important. With those rules in mind, they had gotten along just fine until Caroline died at an untimely fifty-five of breast cancer.

“You went to live with them before I was born,” Tessa said. This part of her mother’s life was vaguely familiar. The family had referred to that year politely, if rarely.

“It was the worst year of my life.” Nancy kicked off her flip-flops and tucked her feet under her bottom, exactly the way she had so often instructed her daughter not to.

“She was hard to live with?” Tessa asked.

“Your grandfather, too. Harry drank. Steadily, from the moment he got up. As the day got longer, he got quieter and more controlled. He moved like a nineteenth-century Chinese courtesan with bound feet, mincing little steps….” She walked her fingers along the chair arm to demonstrate. “And by dinnertime he had nothing to say to anyone. Caroline would berate him, and he wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow. She berated me, and he didn’t even notice.”

Nancy hesitated. “But I shouldn’t be telling you this, Tessa. They were your grandparents.”

Nobody knew better the damage that alcohol could do. Tessa felt her own breathing quicken in protest. “Dad used to drink quite a bit.”

“Yes, he did. But he hasn’t had a drink in years.”

“Three years, to be exact,” Tessa said. Her father hadn’t had a drink since Kayley’s death.

“Yes. But Billy never drove when he drank. And neither did Harry. They had a driver in the old days, a man named Randall, who drove Harry anywhere, saw that he was put to bed, mixed his first drink of the morning. A paid enabler.”

Tessa carefully snipped a thread, then another. “What was it like living with them? And why did you? Didn’t you say you wanted to help Dad through college? Didn’t you want to live with him in Charlottesville?”

“I haven’t upset the apple cart enough by telling you what I told you yesterday? You understand there are always two sides to every story?”

Tessa hadn’t sensed any desire for payback in her mother’s version of events. She didn’t think Nancy was trying to get even for the way she’d been treated by enlisting Tessa’s sympathy and support. She’d simply told the story.

Tessa looked up from the quilt. “I think I need to understand myself better. Maybe this will help.”

“Give me a mission, any mission, and I’ll perform?”

“No, just tell me the truth the way you saw it.”

“I can do that,” Nancy said at last. “Because there weren’t any villains and definitely no saints. Just people caught up in a situation.”

“
I’m
the situation,” Tessa reminded her. “Your love child.”

“No, sweetie,
marriage
was the situation. I was quilting mine together, the way I quilted that top you’re working on. And you know what? Marriage can really be a bitch.” She laughed when Tessa’s eyes widened at the unexpected and uncharacteristic profanity. “Well, can’t it?” she demanded.

Tessa smiled, and her gaze drifted back to the quilt as Nancy began.

December 1965

B
illy’s parents had been thrilled when he gave Mary Lou Stalcourt his fraternity pin during his junior year at UVA. “Lou’s” Atlanta family had Old South heritage and New South money, and Lou understood every nuance of gracious living.

Billy’s parents were
not
thrilled when he gave Nancy a wedding ring. The resulting conversation had contained so many words like
annulment, misjudgment
and
entrapment
that Nancy wondered if she had stumbled into a quiz show with “words ending in ‘ment’” as the only category.

Now she had new words to add to that list:
disappointment, discouragement, disillusionment.

Two weeks before her second Christmas as a married woman, Nancy woke up in the room she shared with her baby daughter and peeked out of half-opened lids, hoping, as she had every morning for a year, that she would see the narrow confines of her farmhouse bedroom.

As always, she was out of luck.

Her room in the Whitlock house was high-ceilinged and spacious, with multi-paned windows draped in sheer curtains that danced as heat from the floor register wafted through the room. The furniture was French Provincial, even Tessa’s crib and changing table. Nancy’s ornate white-and-gold canopy bed was hung with yards and yards of floral polished cotton that matched the bedspread and the overstuffed chairs by the fireplace. Thick white area rugs covered the polished wood floors.

Two dressers and a walk-in closet hid all their clothes and anything else that was remotely useful. If Nancy dropped one of Tessa’s blankets on the floor, Hattie, the Whitlocks’ housekeeper, picked it up, folded it and stuffed it in a drawer before Nancy could even apologize.

A discreet knock sounded on her bedroom door, and Hattie came in without waiting for permission. She was a middle-aged woman whose dark skin was not suited to the dove gray uniform she was required to wear. Nancy couldn’t guess Hattie’s age, although she suspected she was younger than she looked. Mrs. Whitlock demanded long hours, and Nancy knew that when Hattie went home, she cooked and cleaned all over again. By herself, Mrs. Whitlock was enough to age anyone.

Hattie set a breakfast tray on Nancy’s nightstand. A baby’s bottle sat at one edge, a glass of orange juice at the other. “Brought you one of those biscuits you like so much. Just don’t tell Mrs. Whitlock.”

Nancy smiled her thanks. Eating habits were among the many changes Caroline Whitlock had demanded of her new daughter-in-law. A cottage cheese and canned pear dieter, Caroline saw nothing positive in Nancy’s love affair with Virginia country cooking. Nancy was not overweight, but in Caroline’s mind, she was only one biscuit away from becoming the side-show fat lady.

“Is she gone for the day?” Nancy asked.

Hattie gave a brief shake of her head. “She’ll want to see that baby before she goes.”

Nancy was sorry. Caroline’s desire to see Tessa would mean waking her daughter, who had been up for hours through the night because she was cutting a new tooth. Caroline would expect Tessa to be bathed and dressed in one of many frilly dresses she had bought for her granddaughter. And Caroline had little patience with a fussy baby.

“She won’t understand if I tell her Tessa needs to sleep, will she?”

Hattie had perfected the ability to keep her thoughts out of her voice and eyes. The skill automatically went with serving rich white people, but her guard was down with Nancy. Over the months, the two women had developed a mutual interest in keeping Caroline Whitlock off their backs. Now she just gave Nancy the look that silently said “Are you kidding?”

“Maybe I can give Tessa a bottle while I eat, and she’ll be awake enough afterwards to put on a good show,” Nancy said.

Hattie looked doubtful. “You go take a shower, and I’ll give it to her.”

“Would you?” Feeding Tessa was not among Hattie’s myriad duties. The Whitlocks had made it clear that caring for Tessa without help was Nancy’s punishment for the sin of marrying their son. That and living with them in the cheerless Georgian mansion that backed up to the James River, while Billy finished his education in Charlottesville.

“You go on. And take that biscuit with you, case she comes in,” Hattie said.

Nancy returned ten minutes later, awake, full and dressed in one of the insipid flowered shirtwaist dresses that her mother-in-law had chosen for her. A protesting Tessa was snuggled deep into Hattie’s arms, but she wasn’t happy about it.

“There’s my little girl.” Nancy reached for her daughter, and a grateful Hattie relinquished her burden.

“She ain’t happy to be up,” Hattie said. “Not one little bit.”

Nancy made a face. “She’d be happier if she didn’t have to wake up to a command performance.”

“Mrs. Whitlock says a baby has to be on schedule, and it’s up to you to make sure she is.”

Nancy’s gaze flicked to Hattie’s tired face, and the two women gave each other a brief conspiratorial smile. “I don’t know how poor Billy turned out as good as he did,” Nancy whispered.

“Young Mr. Whitlock got himself raised up by
my
mama, that’s how. His own mama was too busy.”

Nancy was surprised at the revelation. “Your mother?”

“The family business.”

Nancy giggled. “She did a good job, don’t you think?”

“Mama raised eight of her own. She could have raised him up with one little finger after that.”

Hattie departed, and Nancy was sad to see her go. Hattie was her only friend in Richmond.

“Good morning, Teresa Michelle,” Nancy crooned. “Dood, dood morning…” She rubbed her nose against her baby daughter’s soft cheek.

Tessa babbled a greeting as she batted at her mother’s face. As always, Nancy’s heart filled with such love that she was afraid it was going to spill out for everyone to see.

The next fifteen minutes did not go as well. Tessa was still tired, and she was not in the mood to be bathed and dressed in one of the stiff, lace-edged dresses that Caroline had bought her. But given the choice between a scene with her daughter and one with her mother-in-law, Nancy chose wisely and continued to dress the baby, adding matching lace-trimmed ankle socks and tiny patent leather shoes. Tessa’s fine hair wouldn’t hold a barrette, but she combed it with water and stood back to see the final result.

Her daughter was breathtakingly gorgeous.

Nancy scooped Tessa out of the crib, where she was frantically gnawing her favorite teething ring. “We have to leave this,” she said softly. “Grandmother Whitlock doesn’t like to watch you chew.”

She swung the baby out of the crib and held her in the air, jiggling her a little until Tessa laughed with delight. And when she swung her down to her hip to take her downstairs, she found that her mother-in-law was standing in the doorway watching.

“Oh,” Nancy said, startled. She couldn’t think of another thing to say.

“I’m on my way out. I thought I’d stop and see my granddaughter.”

Nancy didn’t need an explanation. Clearly Billy’s mother was not there to see her. “I was just bringing her downstairs to say goodbye.”

“Yes, well, I didn’t have all day.”

“I’m sorry. I just—”

Caroline waved off the explanation. “I don’t think you should be jostling the child the way you do, Nancy. It’s not healthy, and it overstimulates her.”

“I was trying to distract her. She wants the teething ring.”

“She doesn’t need it.”

Nancy approached Caroline. When she was only a few feet away, she held Tessa out for her mother-in-law to claim, but Caroline shook her head.

“I don’t want her drooling on this dress.”

Privately, Nancy thought the unadorned sweater dress could do with a little drool. “I hope you’re going somewhere enjoyable.”

“My garden club meeting. I would bring you with me, but Tessa needs you.”

Nancy knew that was only an excuse. Her mother-in-law had made certain to introduce Nancy to only a select few of her friends. Nancy was not yet up to Caroline’s high standards and probably wouldn’t be for some time, if ever. Nancy wasn’t sure what excuses Caroline used not to bring her along to social gatherings, but they seemed to be working, since Nancy never received invitations on her own.

“Is there anything you’d like me to do for you today?” Nancy switched Tessa to her other hip, hoping it would delay more fretting.

“I’ll be bringing some women home with me to see our holiday decorations. Please put Tessa down for a nap by one o’clock so she won’t disturb us.”

Nancy waited to see if she would be invited downstairs to meet her mother-in-law’s friends, but Caroline only smiled thinly. “You’ll need to stay upstairs with her, of course, so you can hear her if she wakes.”

“Of course.” Nancy’s tone was not as accommodating as her words. Caroline’s eyes narrowed.

“I’m sorry you find your duties with the baby so onerous, Nancy, but perhaps you should have considered how much work a child would be before you got pregnant.”

Nancy usually backed down from any confrontation with her mother-in-law, but this morning she was exhausted and more than a bit annoyed that she’d had to wake her daughter for what amounted to nothing more than a military inspection. She answered without taking the time to think.

“I don’t find Tessa onerous in any way. I do find isolation tedious.”

“Then perhaps you should have thought about the effect your presence would have on the lives of others.”

“Perhaps your son should have thought about it, too. Or maybe his Southern Gentleman lessons weren’t as complete as they should have been.”

Caroline took a step backwards, but not from dismay. She put distance between them so she could regard Nancy more fully. “You are a guest in this house. And if you’re trying to prove that you’re ready to be introduced to my friends, then you’re doing a dismal job of it.”

“There is no proof under the stars that would be good enough for you. Don’t pretend there is.” Nancy felt tears of exhaustion, loneliness, frustration, rising inside her.

“William is coming home in a few days. I’m going to discuss this behavior with him.”

“What behavior? And why would I care what you say to Billy? What can you do that you haven’t done already? Get a lock for the door? Put bars on the windows?” Nancy turned before Caroline could see her cry. She heard the door close behind her mother-in-law, and for a moment she wondered if Caroline might actually take her suggestions seriously. But there was no dead bolt to shove into place. Caroline depended on the force of her personality to keep her daughter-in-law in line.

Tessa cried, frantically shoving her tiny fist into her mouth, and Nancy cried right along with her.

After a few minutes Nancy took Tessa back to the changing table and stripped off the shoes and socks and dress through her tears. Despite everything she’d said, she believed the problem was hers more than it was Caroline’s. Faced with the prospect of their son quitting school to live a hand-to-mouth existence with a new wife and child, the senior Whitlocks had made the choice they deemed best for everyone. They had invited Tessa and Nancy to live with them while Billy finished school

The third choice, lending Billy enough money to finish school and rent an apartment large enough to accommodate the three of them, had not been an option for a number of reasons that the Whitlocks had carefully listed. Billy could not be expected to study with a baby and a wife in close quarters. Nancy was too young to be left without supervision in proper mothering skills. Richmond and Charlottesville were close enough that the young couple would see each other whenever Billy wasn’t occupied with school or the part-time job he’d taken to pay his new wife’s expenses.

A circumstance that fell somewhere between rarely and never.

Once she was dressed in corduroy overalls and a soft shirt, Tessa’s sobbing and fidgeting subsided. Nancy washed her own face and combed her hair, then, with Tessa on her hip, she went downstairs, past artificial wreaths and swags that adorned the circular stair railing, past the parlor where a silver Christmas tree decorated with royal blue balls glistened under rotating, multi-colored spotlights.

They settled in the kitchen, where Tessa’s high chair resided. The baby ate a big breakfast of rice cereal and mashed banana, and chewed enthusiastically on pieces of a day-old sweet potato biscuit that Hattie had brought from home and hidden away for her.

“You don’t be crying over anything that woman says to you,” Hattie told her, after taking one look at Nancy’s red-rimmed eyes. “She knows she can get to you, she be doing it more often.”

Nancy was too miserable to protest. “Why do you stay here?”

“I got a family I got to feed. Better question’s why do you?”

Nancy had thought many times of leaving. She could wait until Caroline left for the day, get Randall to drive her downtown, then get on a bus. She could go to Charlottesville, or a town where Helen could pick her up and take her back to Toms Brook.

The problem was that she knew she wasn’t really welcome in either place. Helen had been furious to find her daughter was pregnant and married, and their conversations ever since had been brief and filled with criticism. She had only seen Tessa twice, and she hadn’t seemed impressed.