The Keeper of Happy Endings

by Davis, Barbara

  As usual, the house was immaculate, a study in monied good taste with its plush beige carpets and carefully matched furniture. And the correct art on the walls, of course—bowls of fruit and pitchers of overblown poppies, hanging in heavy gilt frames. Not an item askew or a speck of dust to be seen.

  It had looked like this even when she was little, thanks to her mother’s militant rules about cleanliness. No shoes beyond the foyer. No hands on the walls. No food or drink beyond the dining room—unless there was a party. And there were plenty of parties. Tea parties, cocktail parties, dinner parties, and of course the fundraisers for her mother’s pet charities, each catered to perfection, then painstakingly cleared by a crew of professionals kept on speed dial.

  She found her mother in the kitchen, pouring fresh-squeezed orange juice into a cut-glass pitcher, her signature gold charm bracelet tinkling as she worked. She looked crisp and tidy in khakis and a starched white blouse, her heavy gold waves pulled back in a low Town & Country ponytail. As usual, her makeup was flawless, subtle eyes, lightly rouged cheeks, a hint of frosty peach gloss on her lips. At forty-two, she was still capable of turning heads.

  She looked up when Rory entered. “There you are,” she said, performing a quick but thorough inventory of her daughter. “I was beginning to think you weren’t coming again. Is your hair wet?”

  “I didn’t have time to blow it out. What do you need me to do?”

  “Everything’s done, and I hope not cold.” She handed Rory a plate of perfectly sliced melon and a bowl brimming with strawberries. “Take those out to the table. I’ll bring the rest.”

  Rory took the fruit and headed for the terrace. It was a perfect morning, the sky a dizzying blue, the breeze ripe with the promise of an early summer. Below, Boston stretched in all directions, a jumble of crooked streets and tumbling rooftops. Storrow Drive with its endless ribbon of traffic, the Esplanade sprawling leafy and green, the shining stretch of the Charles River, dotted with bright little sailboats.

  She adored the city with all its contradictions, its rich colonial history and vibrant melting-pot culture. Art, food, music, and science, all rubbing elbows and vying for attention. But there was something about seeing it like this, away from the bustle and noise, that had always felt a little magical when she was growing up, as if she might suddenly grow wings with which to fly away.

  She used to dream of flying away a lot when she was a girl, of being someone else, living another life. One that was her own. A career that had nothing to do with her mother. A husband who was nothing like her father. She’d almost done it too.

  Almost.

  The word felt like a stone in her chest, the weight of it always with her, making simple tasks like going to the market or meeting a friend feel almost overwhelming. It wasn’t normal, this need to retreat from the world. But it wasn’t new either. She had always leaned toward the introverted end of the spectrum, doing her best to avoid dinner parties and other social events, not to mention the attention that came with being the daughter of one of Boston’s most prominent social and philanthropic elites.

  Never a hair out of place, never a faux pas made—that was Camilla Lowell Grant. The right clothes, the right home, the right art. The right everything, if you didn’t count the chronically unfaithful husband and the intractable daughter. Still, Camilla bore her burdens admirably. Most of the time.

  Rory took in the table as she set down the fruit plates. It looked like something out of Victoria magazine: crisp white islet laid with her grandmother’s Royal Albert china, linen napkins flawlessly folded beside each place setting. And in the center, a bowl of waxy white gardenias—her mother’s signature flower. Perfection, as usual.

  The brunch tradition had begun on her twelfth birthday and had quickly become a weekly event. The menu varied from week to week—fresh fruit and some sort of pastry baked from scratch, toast points with smoked salmon and creamy Boursin cheese, flawlessly turned omelets made with whatever was in season, and the one constant: mimosas made with freshly squeezed orange juice and perfectly chilled Veuve Clicquot.

  It was meant to be a time for catching up, but lately, their tête-à-têtes had become increasingly tense as her mother found new and not-so-subtle ways to suggest it might be time to move on with her life.

  Rory fingered the ruby ring on her left hand, a small oval with a tiny nick at the bottom. It was the ring Hux’s father had used to propose to his mother, all he’d been able to afford as a soldier returning from the Korean War. Hux had promised to take her shopping for a proper ring, but he’d wanted to use his mother’s ring to actually pop the question. Touched by his sentimentality, she had opted to keep the original, thrilled that he would entrust her with something so precious. Now his mother’s ring was all she had.

  She pushed the thought away when Camilla appeared carrying two plates. “Mushroom and asparagus frittatas,” she announced, setting down the plates with a flourish.

  “It looks delicious,” Rory said, taking her usual chair. Her mother had never been the domestic type, but she certainly knew her way around a kitchen.

  Camilla slid several catalogs from beneath her arm and handed them to Rory before settling across from her. “They came last week, but you skipped out on brunch. I was tempted to tell the postwoman I didn’t know anyone named Rory, but did she have anything for my daughter, Aurora.”

  Rory managed a dry smile. “You need some new material, Mother. That joke’s getting old.”

  “Rory is a boy’s name. Your name is Aurora. And it’s a beautiful name. A lady’s name.”

  “An old lady’s name,” Rory shot back. “And it was Daddy who shortened it. It obviously never bothered him.”

  Camilla responded with a huff. “You have to be around to be bothered.”

  Rory picked up her fork, poking listlessly at her frittata. It was true. Her father’s interests had always lain elsewhere. She had no idea how many affairs there’d been, though she suspected her mother could provide an exact tally. She’d kept careful tabs on the women who moved in and out of Geoffrey Grant’s life over the years, carefully adding each name to the collection, like quarters to a swear jar.

  Why she’d never divorced him was beyond Rory, though she suspected the weekend at Doral with his twenty-eight-year-old receptionist might have proven the coup de grâce if he hadn’t ended up dying in her bed first. It was the type of scandal from which most society wives never quite recovered, a cliché of the most delicious and disastrous variety, but for Camilla, it became the crown jewel in her collection of betrayals, a badge of honor, purchased with her pride.

  “Aren’t you eating?”

  Rory picked up a strawberry, nibbling dutifully. Camilla had pulled the bottle of Veuve from the ice and was wrestling with the cork. After a few minutes, Rory reached across the table and took the bottle from her. “Let me have that before you take out someone’s eye.”

  The cork came free with a hollow pop. Rory poured champagne into a pair of flutes and topped both with a splash of orange juice.

  They touched glasses wordlessly, out of habit, then turned their attention to the food. Camilla did most of the talking, with only a minimum of input required on Rory’s part. Gossip about plastic surgery and rumored divorces. A friend’s upcoming trip to Ireland. What was coming to the Boston Opera House next season. The theme for the holiday charity ball she was organizing again this year. Eventually the small talk ran out and the conversation wandered into familiar if uncomfortable territory.

  “I ran into Dinah Marshall the other day when I was dropping off my watch to be repaired. Denise, her youngest, is heading to Boston College in the fall. She’s going to study music. The harp, I think. I told her you were back to Tufts in August to finish up your master’s. And then perhaps on to Paris next summer for that internship we talked about. She asked me to pass along her congratulations.”

  “Denise plays the piano,” Rory answered flatly. “Patricia plays the harp.”

  “Yes, of co
urse. Piano.” Camilla lifted her napkin, dabbing daintily at her mouth. “And what about you? Are you excited about going back?”

  Rory reached for the champagne bottle and topped off her glass, forgoing the orange juice this time. She sipped slowly, then raised her eyes to her mother. “I’m not excited about anything.”

  Camilla sighed as she slid a scone onto her plate. “Are you pouting, Aurora?”

  “I’m twenty-three years old, Mother. I don’t pout.”

  “Really? What do you call what’s happening now?”

  Rory put down her mimosa and sat up very straight. “We haven’t seen each other in three weeks. Were you not even going to ask about Hux?”

  Camilla blinked at her. “Of course I was.”

  “When? We’ve finished breakfast. We’ve talked about Vicky Foster’s face-lift, the appalling food in the UK, your plans for the holiday ball, and Dinah Marshall’s daughter going back to school. Yet you couldn’t find time to slip my fiancé’s name into the conversation.”

  “Really, you can’t expect me to just blurt out something like that over breakfast.”

  “What does breakfast have to do with it?”

  The corners of Camilla’s mouth turned down in a nearly perfect pout. “I was being delicate.”

  “Delicate?” The word set Rory’s teeth on edge, as if good table manners were an excuse for not giving a damn. “I don’t need you to be delicate, Mother. I need you to care. But you don’t. You never have.”

  Camilla’s eyes widened. “What a thing to say.”

  “You never liked him. From day one, you acted like he was some phase I’d grow out of, the way you hoped I’d grow out of liking soccer.”

  “That isn’t true.”

  “It absolutely is. You didn’t like his looks, or his surfing, or the fact that he left private practice. But the real problem is you don’t like that he’s from a little beach town in North Carolina that no one’s ever heard of. That his parents taught high school instead of organizing card games and dinner parties.”

  There it was, her mother’s patented look of indignation—the squared shoulders and tilted chin, the cool glare aimed straight down her perfect patrician nose. “That’s an awful thing to imply.”

  “I didn’t imply it. I said it straight out. Most mothers would consider someone like Hux a great catch, but not you. You want someone with the right last name and a Mayflower sticker on their steamer trunk, and now that Hux is missing, you see the chance for a do-over. Though I’m not sure why you think your marital track record qualifies you to choose anyone else’s husband.”

  Camilla went still, her face frozen, as if she’d received a slap she hadn’t seen coming.

  “I’m sorry,” Rory blurted. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Of course you did.”

  Rory blew out a breath, angry with herself for striking such a low blow. “I’m sorry. I was just lashing out and you got in the way.”

  Camilla’s expression morphed into one of concern. “Has there been . . . news?”

  “No. No news. Never mind. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Then what do you want to talk about? I have no idea what’s happening in your life these days. You don’t return my phone calls. You turn down my invitations for dinner. You’ve skipped brunch two weeks in a row. What have you been up to?”

  Rory stared into her glass, her throat suddenly thick. “Waiting, mostly.”

  “Sweetheart . . .” Camilla reached across the table, brushing Rory’s bangs out of her eyes.

  “Don’t,” Rory snapped, jerking her head away. “I don’t want you to feel sorry for me.”

  “Then what do you want? I’m worried about you. You spend your days with your nose buried in one of those awful books or glued to the television, watching some old black-and-white tearjerker until all hours. We talked about this. It isn’t healthy.”

  “I’m fine. I just . . .” She looked away, wanting desperately not to be having this discussion again. “I just need time.”

  “Sweetheart, it’s been five months.”

  Rory shot her a look. “I wasn’t aware that there was a time limit.”

  “That isn’t what I meant. I only mean that whatever has happened to Matthew, whether he’s alive somewhere or—” She broke off, as if weighing her next words carefully. “You’re still here, Aurora. Still alive. You have to go on, no matter what.”

  Rory swallowed the sting of tears. She wanted to believe Hux was alive somewhere, that he would come home to her one day, but the dread was always there, like an invisible hand hovering at her shoulder. Would tomorrow be the day she got the news? How would it happen? A letter? A phone call? Would someone knock on her door? She’d never screwed up the courage to ask. Asking would have made it too real, and it was already real enough.

  “What if I can’t go on?” she asked quietly.

  “Don’t be silly. Of course you can. It’s what the Grants do.”

  Rory smothered a sigh, wishing she could make her understand. “I just don’t care. About anything.” She looked at her mother, so cool and well groomed, unflappable. “You have no idea what that’s like, do you? To wake up in the morning and not have the will to put your feet on the floor, to shower and dress and go out into the world where everywhere you look, life is galloping off without you. You’ve never lost someone you cared about. And don’t say Daddy. We both know it’s not the same thing.”

  Camilla opened her mouth, then closed it again, as if rethinking her initial response. “You have no idea what I’ve lost, Aurora,” she said finally.

  Rory narrowed her eyes, surprised by Camilla’s cryptic tone. There was so much about her mother’s life she didn’t know. So much she’d sealed off or refused to talk about. “Was there someone?” she asked softly. “Someone before Daddy?”

  “I was eighteen when I married your father. There wasn’t time for anyone else.”

  “Okay, then. Not before. But later . . . during?”

  Camilla stared at her, aghast. “Certainly not!”

  “Then what? What don’t I know?”

  Camilla waved a hand, clearly ready to change the subject. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter now. But for the record, mothers are human too. We’ve had lives and been disappointed. We bleed like everyone else. But we have responsibilities, duties to fulfill and appearances to maintain. And so we keep moving forward.”

  “Except I can’t see forward. I can’t see anything. It’s like the future’s just . . . gone.”

  “You need to get out, Aurora, to be around people. There’s a cocktail thing happening at Marcos next week. One of Cassandra Maitland’s private dos for some new cellist she’s discovered. Why don’t you come with me? We could go to Rosella for hair and nails in the morning, get those bangs of yours trimmed, then pick up something fun for you to wear. There’s nothing like a good splurge before a party to lift your spirits. And it’ll do you good to see some of the old crowd, to feel normal again.”

  Rory eyed her coolly. “Normal?”

  “Please don’t look at me like that. You can’t just keep hiding. I’m worried about you. Maybe it’s time . . . to talk to someone?”

  Rory stiffened. “You think I’m crazy?”

  Camilla folded her napkin carefully before setting it aside. “I think you’re having trouble coping with what’s happened, and that talking to someone about it might be helpful.” She paused, then added gently, “Someone you trust.”

  Rory sat quietly, absorbing the sting of her mother’s words. “I’m sorry,” she said finally. “About before and what I said. It’s just . . . Hux.” Her throat tightened around his name. “I spent two hours on the phone again Friday, most of it on hold. It’s always the same runaround. We’re doing everything in our power. But it isn’t true. How can it be when they don’t even know where he is?”

  Camilla responded with another of her customary huffs. “How is that even possible? Surely we have people who specialize in this sort of thing. Ambassador
s. Diplomats. The president, for heaven’s sake.”

  A familiar stone lodged in Rory’s chest, the same stone that always lodged there when she let herself think about the unthinkable. “It’s starting to feel like he isn’t coming back.”

  “Hush, now,” Camilla said, reaching for her hand. “None of that talk. You must keep your chin up and be brave.”

  Rory gulped back a flood of tears, recalling her freshman year of high school, when she’d vowed never to show her face in school again after failing to make the swim team. Camilla had wrapped her up tightly, whispering those same words against her ear. You must keep your chin up and be brave. But she didn’t feel brave. She felt numb. Lost and exhausted.

  “I read somewhere that the longer he’s missing, the lower the odds of him being found alive.” She reclaimed her hand to wipe her eyes. “I’m starting to lose hope.”

  “Stop that, now. I mean it. You mustn’t dwell on such thoughts. You’ll feel better when school starts in the fall and you’re back to your old routine. Classes and activities with your friends. It’ll help fill your time.”

  Rory thought of the class catalog on her nightstand and nodded, because it was what was expected of her. A stiff upper lip and back to school to finish her MFA, then the internship if her mother had her way, perhaps a curator position someday. So different from the future she and Hux had planned when his time with DWB was over.

  “You know,” Camilla said hesitantly, “I was thinking it might be a good idea for you to move back home until things are . . . settled. It’s just me rattling around the house now, and your room is just like you left it.”

  “Move back home?”

  “I could look after you, cook for you. You wouldn’t have to worry about anything but your studies.”

  Studies. School. The meeting with Lisette!

  “Oh no. What time is it?” Rory glanced at her watch. “I have to go.”

  “What—now?”