Age Before Beauty

by Virginia Smith

  Joanie’s face lit when she caught sight of Allie, and she let out a delighted gurgling coo. Her little hands waved excitedly and both legs kicked the air.

  The eyes Allie turned upward to him gleamed with delight. “She’s happy to see me! Did you hear her?”

  Eric nodded. “She’s been vocal like that all night.”

  A hurt frown creased her forehead. Eric wanted to kick himself. Allie was so defensive lately, and sure Joanie didn’t miss her at all. What was wrong in letting her think her daughter was glad to see her? Sometimes he didn’t think before he spoke. “Look at those legs kicking. She knows her mama’s home.”

  “Yes she does!” Allie scooped the baby up and buried kisses in her neck.

  Eric dropped to the floor beside his wife and daughter and planted a kiss on Allie’s cheek. “I’m glad to see you too.”

  Allie beamed at him, her smile restored. She sat back against the couch, positioned Joanie in the crease of her bent legs and grabbed both little hands. “Thanks, Betty, for watching her until Eric got home. I hope she wasn’t any trouble.”

  “None at all.”

  Eric glanced at Mother, whose sedate position had not changed. She watched Allie and Joanie through an expression as unreadable as ever. And she didn’t meet Eric’s gaze. A tacit signal that she hoped he wouldn’t resume their conversation in front of Allie? Probably. But Eric intended to pin her down later.

  “Actually, Mother had her until after seven tonight,” he said. He watched Joanie plant her feet on Allie’s stomach and straighten.

  Allie lifted her up to a standing position, her hands holding Joanie’s rib cage and supporting the back of her head with her fingers. “Did you have to work late?”

  “No, I stopped by Molly’s to tighten a few loose boards on her deck.”

  Allie’s head snapped sideways, her eyes wide. “You went to Molly’s again?”

  He didn’t look up, but watched Joanie’s attempt to stand and hold her neck steady at the same time. “Just for a couple of hours. That deck was unsafe. I noticed it Saturday.”

  “Doesn’t Molly have somebody else to do things like that for her? Her father, maybe?”

  Eric shook his head. “Her father’s dead, and her mother is elderly. No brothers. And of course she doesn’t have a husband.”

  “Well, lately she doesn’t seem to need one. She has mine.” Allie’s mouth closed so fast he heard her teeth snap.

  “I’m just helping out a friend.” Anger flickered at the edge of his mind. Why did he need to defend himself for doing a good deed?

  Mother rose silently from the chair and left the room. A second later he heard the soft click of the bedroom door shutting. A tactful exit. Eric didn’t look in that direction but studied Allie’s profile through narrowed eyes.

  “Did you eat supper there?” Her words came out clipped.

  “She ordered pizza.” From the flush that stained her cheeks, Eric knew she didn’t like the answer. “I spent most of the time with her oldest boy, Mikey. The kid is seven years old and obviously starved for male attention.”

  Allie refused to look at him. “So you spent your evening playing with someone else’s child while yours was at home without a parent.”

  “She had a grandparent,” he shot back. “Which is a good thing, since her mother wasn’t here.”

  Allie’s head snapped sideways, and fury sparked in her eyes. She spoke through gritted teeth. “I was working, Eric.”

  “I understand that, but I don’t see why you have to be gone every night.”

  Joanie whimpered, and Allie laid her back down on her lap. He saw Allie swallow, and when she spoke it was with obvious effort to keep her tone even. “It takes a lot of work to start up a business. I thought you understood that.”

  “I do.” Eric paused to gather the thoughts that had plagued him at odd times lately. “I guess I just see you throwing yourself into this, and I don’t get it.”

  “You don’t get me wanting to be successful?”

  He looked over her head at the curtains, choosing his words with care. “I don’t get why you’re doing it to begin with. You don’t have to work. You could stay home with Joanie. I told you that.”

  “And I told you—”

  He held up a hand. “I know you want to earn money so you can pay your share of the bills. I just don’t see why you have to do something that takes so much of your time away from Joanie.” He looked down at her. “And from me.”

  Emotions flickered across her face. Her jaw relaxed and then tensed again. What was she thinking? This conversation had taken an unexpected, and uncomfortable, turn. He didn’t want her to think he resented her work with this Varie Cose thing. He really didn’t. It’s just that Allie was one of those women who threw herself into everything. She was one of the smartest people he’d ever met, and she had three times more energy than anyone else he knew. Whatever she focused that energy on was bound to be a success. But she was also single-minded at times, and lately he was beginning to feel, well, a little ignored.

  Her eyelids narrowed and she sucked in a breath. “You changed the subject. We were talking about you spending time at Molly’s, and you turned it to attack my job. Almost as though you’re hiding something.”

  So much for communication. Disgust blasted through his lips. “That’s ridiculous. I’m not going to listen to this.”

  He got to his feet and left the room, shaking his head. Women defied understanding. Sure, he got the fact that she needed to work hard if she was determined to do this sales business. But apparently she thought he had to sit at home waiting for her like a good little househusband. Allie might be smart, but if that’s what she thought, she had another thing coming.

  14

  Allie stood over the changing table and fastened the plastic snaps on Joanie’s one-piece jumpsuit. She was growing so fast! Her feet finally filled out the footies on this outfit. They waved in the air as Joanie kicked with energy, cooing, and Allie grabbed them and planted a kiss on each sole. Her baby was nearly eight weeks old! She could hardly believe it. If she hadn’t decided to do Varie Cose, she would be going back to work on Monday, in just five days.

  Her boss Gina wasn’t very happy with Allie’s decision not to return, but she understood. She refused to accept Allie’s final resignation, though, and said she was going to change Allie’s employment status to Unpaid Leave of Absence, so if she changed her mind and wanted to come back, she could.

  “I hate to tell her, but there’s no way.” Allie tickled her daughter’s bulging belly, which made Joanie gurgle and kick.

  “Anybody home?” Joan’s voice called from the front door.

  “Your aunt Joan is here,” Allie told her daughter. She raised her head and called, “In the nursery.”

  Joan appeared a moment later and, as Allie expected, scooped Joanie into her arms. “Look at you, little one. You’re all dressed and ready for the day.” Joan glanced at Allie and went on in a drier tone. “Unlike your mama.”

  Allie looked down at her flannel pajamas and fluffy bedroom slippers. “Hey, I’m dressed for the day. This is how people who work at home dress.”

  “Must be nice.” Joan wore a navy blue jacket and slacks, appropriate attire for her job as manager of a furniture rental store. “Hey, I stopped by on the way to work to trade that lipstick. You said I could return it if I wanted to, and I don’t like the color.”

  “Sure, no problem. C’mon in here.” Allie led the way to her bedroom/office, Joan following along with Joanie.

  “Good morning, Betty,” Joan called into the kitchen as they passed the doorway.

  Allie heard Betty’s quiet reply but couldn’t make out the words. She had been seated at the kitchen table since breakfast, sipping coffee and looking through an issue of Cooking Light. Probably planning another low-fat, low-cal meal for supper. Actually, that suited Allie just fine. She’d be home for dinner this evening because it was Halloween and nobody wanted to book a party on trick-or-treat ni
ght. Her diet was going pretty well, and her clothes felt a tiny bit looser. Now that she’d gotten past the initial hurt feelings over Eric’s gift, she’d been meaning to go by the gym to activate her membership and check the place out, but there never seemed to be any time. At least with Betty’s focus on healthy meals, she was eating sensibly.

  “Wow, would you look at that?” Joan stopped just inside the bedroom door and stared open-mouthed at the far end of the room.

  Allie let her gaze sweep over the well-stocked shelves with a feeling of satisfaction. Her shipment from Varie Cose arrived yesterday. Though she didn’t even come close to Sally Jo’s inventory, she had a respectable amount of product on hand. She turned to respond to Joan and saw her sister’s eyes weren’t on the shelves.

  “I’ve never seen such a mess.” Joan shook her head. “How do you find anything?”

  Allie followed her sister’s gaze to the desk. Papers littered the surface amid piles of catalogs and file folders and packing slips from yesterday’s shipment. She’d dumped the contents of her briefcase there last night, intending to spend today sorting everything out.

  “I haven’t exactly settled on a filing system yet. But I know exactly where everything is.” She rounded the bed and grabbed a catalog. “Here, look through the lip colors and let me know which one you want to trade for.”

  While Joan, perched on the mattress edge, went through the catalog to the lipstick pages, Allie sifted through the papers on the desk to find her order folder. She dumped the contents onto the bedspread and flipped through them with an index finger to find Joan’s original sales slip.

  Watching her, Joan cringed. “Allie, you’ve got to be more organized. You can’t run a business by dumping things in a file.”

  “I know, I know.” She spied one from the date of Mom’s party and thumbed through the papers until she found Joan’s. She held it up triumphantly. “See, I told you I knew where everything was.”

  “You’re so good at computer stuff I’m surprised you haven’t developed some sort of computer system to help you get organized.”

  Joan had always been Miss Organization, but she wasn’t very good with computers beyond the basics. Allie loved computers and had even built a couple of databases at work to help keep track of her home visits and clients. She looked at the mess on the bed. Actually, Joan’s idea wasn’t a bad one. The Varie Cose website had an ordering system, but not much else.

  “I like this one.” Joan slid the catalog across the mattress and tapped on Soft Sienna.

  Allie hopped off the bed. “I have that one in stock.”

  She retrieved the appropriate box and handed it to Joan, then made a note of the item number on the sales receipt.

  “Thanks.” Joan pushed the papers out of the way and laid Joanie down on the mattress. She spoke without looking at Allie. “Listen, I wanted to apologize for getting upset about you not bringing Joanie to church. Mom’s right. This is totally yours and Eric’s decision.”

  Allie scooped the papers up and shuffled them into a stack before shoving them back in the folder. She’d known Joan was upset, and the fact that she hadn’t called or come by for two whole days proved it. From the time they were little, Joan always took a while to work through her emotions, whereas Allie reacted in a flash and got over things just as quickly.

  “I appreciate that,” Allie said.

  Joan put an index finger inside a tiny fist and absently caressed the little fingers that closed around it. “But listen, I do think it’s important that Joanie is raised going to church. Even going to the nursery every Sunday is important, because she’ll grow up comfortable there. The nursery workers are godly women, so it would be good for her to be around them.” She ducked her head toward the baby so Allie couldn’t see her face.

  Allie studied her sister’s profile through the straight brown hair spilling forward to tickle Joanie’s skin. Joan must feel really strongly about this, though Allie couldn’t imagine why. True, Mom and Daddy had taken them to church every Sunday when they were kids, but she couldn’t see that it had made that much difference. Their lives weren’t any better off than people who didn’t go to church. Daddy still had affair after affair, and her parents’ marriage still ended in divorce.

  She shook her head. “I don’t get it, Joan. You act like there’s something mystical about that building. There isn’t. Just going to a meeting every Sunday and sitting in a pew to listen to a sermon doesn’t change anything. You can look at our own family and see that.”

  Joan’s head snapped up and she caught Allie’s gaze. “Listening to a sermon doesn’t change anything. Jesus does. I wonder if Daddy ever really knew Jesus.”

  Now it was Allie’s turn to look away. In the past few months Joan had started to use that name so familiarly. She talked about Jesus like he was a regular guy you could walk up to on the street. It made Allie feel weird. She was okay with praying before meals and all that, but this was getting a little too personal. “Well, if he didn’t, then that proves my point. Daddy went to church. It didn’t make a difference. It didn’t stop him from wrecking his marriage and our lives.” She got up from the bed and stepped toward the desk, her back to Joan. “Actually, he’s still wrecking our lives.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Allie put the folder down and reached up to pull the curtains aside. Clouds covered the sky from one horizon to another, creating a white ceiling that left everything below looking dismal. The October wind blew dead leaves down the street in front of her house. “Just that our parents’ relationship continues to affect us even though we’re adults. That’s a psychological fact.”

  “Are you and Eric having problems?”

  Nothing slow about that reaction. Allie wished she had kept her mouth shut. She was just being paranoid, and now Joan would know it. But this Molly thing was starting to worry her. Maybe talking about it with a totally sympathetic person would help her sort out her feelings.

  She turned and faced Joan. “I’m sure it’s nothing. A baby changes the family dynamics, you know. I’ve read up on it. Now that Eric is a father, he’s starting to reevaluate himself and his life in terms of his definition of what a father is.”

  A grin flashed on Joan’s face. “You’re always psychoanalyzing everyone.”

  “It’s true,” Allie insisted.

  “I’m sure it is. But I don’t think you’re concerned with Eric’s definition. What is your definition of a father?”

  The room became quiet as Joan’s question echoed in Allie’s mind. Her sister was right. Allie had married a fun-loving guy, her best friend, a man who cared about others and loved to help anyone in need, and who shared her passion for life. With the birth of their child, Eric had become something else in her mind. Allie suddenly found herself married to a father. Since her own father had hurt her so much, being married to one was emotionally risky for her.

  “Okay.” She struggled to sort out her thoughts as she spoke. “That’s a valid question. Here’s another one. Do you think I’ve unconsciously married someone just like Daddy? You know, tried to replicate my childhood in some weird way.”

  “No.” The speed of Joan’s answer gave Allie comfort. Then she went on. “Daddy wasn’t all bad, you know. We had a lot of good times as a family before he and Mom divorced. So if Eric does have a few of Daddy’s characteristics, that doesn’t mean he’s going to end up having an affair and divorcing you.” Her voice softened. “That’s what you’re worried about, isn’t it?”

  Tears stung Allie’s eyes, which surprised her. Did she really think Eric was having an affair? No. Not really. But she couldn’t deny the fact that their relationship the past few weeks was stormier than it had ever been. Some of that was her fault, of course. If she was going to make a go of her Varie Cose business, she had to pour a lot of effort into it. Why couldn’t he understand that? Why couldn’t he be supportive instead of demanding more attention than she could give him right now?

  “Listen.” Joan reached ou
t and took Allie’s hand. “I don’t know exactly what you’re going through, but we had the same father, remember? You’re asking the same questions I asked a couple of months ago. I found the answer. We have a perfect heavenly Father, Allie, one with none of the faults of our earthly father.”

  Allie looked into Joan’s eyes. She was so earnest, so passionate about her religion. And she had found something a few months ago. The difference in her was noticeable. Joan was more peaceful, more at ease. Happier than Allie could ever remember. Tori attributed that change to Joan’s developing relationship with Ken, but Allie wasn’t so sure. The changes in Joan went too deep to be rooted in a relationship with a man.

  She squeezed her sister’s hand. “I’m so glad you’ve found your answer, Joan. But that doesn’t mean it’s right for everyone. I think we all have to work out our own way around life’s problems.”

  Joan hesitated, then gave a very slight nod. “You’re right. We all have to come to our own decisions. Just know that I’m praying for you and Eric. If there’s anything I can do, you only have to ask.”

  Gratitude washed over Allie. She might lack a good father, but she was lucky enough to have a couple of incredibly supportive sisters. She put her arms around Joan and hugged. “Thank you.”

  Allie spent hours that day in front of her computer. She took a couple of breaks to nurse Joanie and after lunch bundled her up for a walk in the stroller around the neighborhood to give them both a breath of fresh air. The rest of the time Betty seemed more than happy to tend her granddaughter while Allie worked, and Allie gratefully let her. When she finally sat back in her desk chair and smiled at her monitor, her shoulders ached from sitting so long.

  Her database was a work of art. She even designed easy-to-use data entry screens and keyed in all her customers’ names and contact information, along with the specific Varie Cose products they’d ordered. She could print reports that listed and totaled all the orders by hostess, customer, or product. And she’d had a flash of genius when she realized she could scan in the original order forms with her little all-in-one printer, eliminating the need to keep paper copies. She might have a bug or two to work out over the next few days, but all in all, she thought her database was a breathtaking work of sheer brilliance.