Somewhere In-Between

by Donna Milner

  Darla dumped the cucumber into the salad bowl. Popping one into her mouth she pushed her stool away from the island. “I’m going to call Gram,” she said jumping down. “See what she thought of the debate.”

  While Darla retrieved the phone, Julie had tried to ignore the twinge of regret—or was it jealousy?—at losing her daughter’s attention. How could she be jealous of her own mother? Julie forced a smile as Darla climbed back up on the stool and pressed the speed dial for the Vancouver number. As Darla’s interest increased in the US election, she had spent hours talking on the phone with her American-born grandmother. From the other side of the island Julie could hear the joy in her mother’s voice when she realized who was calling.

  “Did you watch the debate, Gram?” Darla asked excitedly, turning on the speakerphone. For the next five minutes Julie remained mute in the background, listening while the conversation segued to her mother sharing her teenage memories of the very first televised presidential debate, between Nixon and John Kennedy in the 1960s.

  “Everyone I knew hopped on the bandwagon for Kennedy, after that,” she reminisced. “It was all very exciting, the same excitement over the possibility of a change I suppose.” Then without waiting for a response she asked, “But what about Hillary Clinton?” changing gears in a way so typical to her. “Wouldn’t it be just as interesting to see a woman become president?”

  “Yeah, sure, but it has to be the right woman,” Darla said, reaching into the salad bowl for a piece of carrot. “Anyway, I think Canada’s more likely to have a female leader before the States.”

  “We already did. Kim Campbell,” Julie interjected just to prove she was in the room.

  “I mean an elected one.”

  “Well, either way, Dear,” her grandmother said without commenting on Julie joining the conversation. “With both a woman and an African-American running for president, we’ve come a long way.”

  “Someone’s gender? The colour of their skin?” Darla rolled her eyes, as if in silent conspiracy with Julie. “Just the fact that we’re talking about it means we still have a long way to go.”

  Later, while they ate dinner alone, because Ian was working late, Julie asked Darla if all this interest in the American election might be leading to an interest in Canadian politics.

  “Très boring,” Darla replied. At her age, nothing was more tragic than boredom.

  “Well, don’t have a cow,” Julie said, causing Darla to roll her eyes once again, this time at Julie’s use of the outdated expression. Still she forged on. “What about the old adage that ‘if you don’t like the way things are, then be part of the change’?”

  “Maybe I will,” Darla shrugged. “Hey, ya never know.”

  You certainly don’t.

  Moments like that evening had convinced Julie that the worst was over. Darla’s rebellious stage had been nothing more than a tempest in a teapot. A minor blip, compared to the storms many parents had to weather. Julie had slowly let down her guard last summer. Then in the fall came Darla’s ‘Big Lie.’

  “Tea’s ready,” Jessie calls from the doorway.

  Startled, Julie drops the photograph. “Be right there.” She retrieves the picture, places it back in the box with the others.

  In the kitchen, the china teapot and cups are set out on the island. Jessie fills Julie’s teacup as she climbs up on her stool. “I know you like it weaker,” she says, then slides a plate of cheese and crackers in front of her.

  Julie smiles, silently blessing her sister for not mentioning her weight loss. Their mother would have no such reservations.

  “Thanks again for talking Mom out of coming up. I don’t think I could bear her criticisms right now. Or to have her and Ian in the same room.”

  Jessie nods with understanding. Their mother has never held back her opinion, and right now her opinion is that what Julie and Ian are doing, ‘moving further out into the “boonies” of British Columbia,’ is ‘downright insanity.’ It took Jessie’s pretence that she had no one to stay with her five- and eight-year-old daughters—Emily and Amanda—while she and her husband, Barry, helped Julie and Ian with the move, to convince their mother not to come.

  Julie appreciates what a sacrifice it is for Jessie, who hates to leave her girls behind whenever she travels. The truth is that there is no need for anyone to help. They have hired professional movers. Except for the sorting of personal things, which Julie refuses to allow anyone else to go through, there is little to do. Still, Jessie had insisted. And Julie has to admit that having her sister and her husband here these last two days has been wonderful. Right now Ian and Barry are out inspecting the ranch before the lawyer releases the funds this afternoon. Julie didn’t bother trying to assure Ian that an inspection was totally unnecessary, that in her experience German clients, with few exceptions, left their properties in good condition, their houses eat-off-the-floor clean. She knows the trip was just an excuse to show off the place to Barry. From the moment they had a solid contract of purchase and sale, Ian found similar pretences each week to run out there. Neither Elke Woell, nor the realtor assured of his commission, objected. Today Julie is glad they are gone. It allows her time alone with her sister.

  “Will you miss it?” Jessie asks over the rim of her teacup. “This house? Town?”

  Julie sets her cup down in the saucer. “You know, I felt like a fish out of water when we left Vancouver and moved to Waverley Creek, twenty, no, twenty-one years ago. God, has it been that long? Anyway, I couldn’t stop hearing Mom calling it an ‘overgrown cow-town in the middle of nowhere.’ And for the first year, I never enjoyed working at Ian’s accounting firm. But after I got my real estate licence and started working with people instead of numbers, this town started to grow on me. I felt at home. By the time Darla was born,” she hesitated, looked down at her hands for a moment before continuing, “I knew I wanted to raise her here. When we bought this house twelve years ago, I thought it would be our last. I imagined her growing up here, graduating, marrying…” her voice cracks and she swallows. “So I guess the answer is yes, and no.”

  She picks up her teacup. “At any rate, it’s too late to even think about that. The truth is right now I’m just following Ian’s lead.” She holds up a hand. “I know, don’t say it. Mom already did. That I’m just letting life happen to me now, not making it happen. She says this move is all about what Ian needs. What Ian wants.”

  “Yeah, well Mother never liked him too much from the beginning, did she?” Jessie asks. “Remember all those ridiculous predictions she made about your marriage? None of which materialized.”

  Julie lowers her eyes, unwilling at this point to let her sister, who knows her so well, read the truth in her eyes.

  Back in the family room she feels like a fraud as she wipes down the cabinet shelves. Yes, this move is all Ian’s idea; he believes it will be their last. For him, perhaps it will. She is less committed to it, to anything right now. Her mother’s right. She is like a leaf on the water, allowing the undercurrents to carry her along at will. Still, she will go along with it right now, see where it leads. Why not? She has nothing but time now.

  Her cloth brushes over a thick paper on the bottom shelf. She reaches in and slides out the unframed portrait. Wiping the dust away, she studies her twenty-two-year-old face, smiling so brightly in spite of the agony caused by the six-inch high heels hidden beneath the satin gown. On her wedding day Julie had believed that the spike heels, the puffed-up back-combed hair and tiara made her look so tall and sophisticated standing beside Ian. Now she sees that she looked like nothing more than an over-made-up child playing dress-up.

  4

  Oh, Mom, it’s not so bad. Okay, yeah, well maybe it is. All those puffs and ruffles look kinda cheesy now. But even with all that silly frou-frou, I’ve always loved Mom and Dad’s wedding photograph. When I was a little girl I would imagine myself wearing her dress when I was grown up and getting married. But that little girl is gone now. And me, walking down the aisl
e wearing a white gown? Not gonna happen.

  Still, I wish Mom would not be so hard on herself—and Dad. I wish she could find a way back to the place they were on the day that photograph was taken; back to the place where all that matters is love.

  A person would have to be blind not to see the electricity between my parents in that picture. Daddy looks like a movie star—no really he does, kind of like a young Tom Hanks—in his black tuxedo, standing beside a princess in a frilly satin gown.

  Maybe all daughters believe their fathers are handsome and their mothers are beautiful. I don’t know, but I truly believe mine are. Inside and out. Sappy, I know. But I think I’m allowed that, after all.

  When I was growing up, I never got tired of hearing Mom tell the story of how she and Dad met. She repeated it so many times, embellishing the details as I got older, that I believe I can tell it even better than her. Yeah. No doubt from my point of view now, I can.

  She was only nineteen when he plunked down in the seat beside her during her first Statistics class at UBC in Vancouver. Glancing up from her notebook, her first thought was, “What a hunk.” The next was, “Tilt!” when he pushed back a lock of coal black hair from his eyes, and she saw the gold band. With a polite smile she turned back to the lecture. She wasn’t on the prowl for anyone, anyway. She was determined to stay uninvolved while she studied for her commerce degree. During grade school and high school, numbers had always intrigued her, she said, had always come comically easy to her. Becoming a chartered accountant appeared to be the natural choice.

  Dad was older than most of the other students. “Changing careers mid-stream,” he told her after they became friends. Study-buddies, Mom swore, was all they were. Yeah, right! Still there must have been some truth to that because his then wife didn’t seem to mind the arrangement. In fact, when exams where looming they took turns studying together late into the nights at his Kitsilano condo, while his wife, a practising orthodontist, slept down the hall. The few times Mom met her, she was surprised that the solemn- looking woman was someone Dad, who could find humour even in numbers, would choose to marry. I saw her in an old photograph of Dad’s, and I have to admit she looked like a pretty unhappy camper.

  At any rate, after a year of sort of hanging together, Dad called Mom one night, sounding really upset, asking if they could meet. Her parents were away in Europe, so she invited him to her home in Point Grey. Hard to imagine her doing that, but, hey, she was old enough to make her own decisions, and like I said, he was, and still is, pretty much a hunk.

  At her parents’ place he had sat on the living room couch with his head in his hands and wept—Mom’s word not mine—because his wife was leaving him. I never could imagine my dad crying. Now, after all that’s happened, no problem picturing that.

  I’m guessing that they ended up in bed that night, although Mom—who believe it or not, hoped I would buy into the old-school stuff about saving myself for marriage—would never ‘fess up’ on that one. She did admit, though, that they started dating afterward. Whatever.

  Gram, of course, went ballistic. I can just see her, pulling her shoulders up, all huffy and ready for battle, when Mom announced they would be getting married as soon as his divorce was final. Gram must have seen right through the ‘just dating’ thing because she came right back with the accusation that she couldn’t believe that a daughter of hers would have an affair with a married man.

  Mom protested, did for a very long time, that things were not that way. “They’re not really together, not living as husband and wife, anymore. They’re just sharing the condo until it’s sold. They don’t sleep together,” she insisted. Gram latched right on to that little fact, asking how she could possibly know that for certain. “Because I believe him,” Mom told her. “I trust him.” She should have stopped there, but I have witnessed their arguments and they both seem to think they have to get in the last word. “At least they don’t have any children,” she told her mother. “He’s just trying to do this whole thing in a civilized manner.” Wow! I can just see Gram’s right eyebrow arching up into that devilish V of hers at that one.

  “If a man will cheat on his wife,” she had prophesied, “he will cheat on his wife—no matter who she is.” Even looking at it all from where I am now, I still have a tough time with that one.

  Anyway, the wedding dress was Mom’s concession to her mother. So in her wedding photograph there she is, lost in the puffy sleeves and billowing Gone With the Wind skirts, forever captured as the little girl trying to appease her overbearing mother.

  All my childhood, Mom always swore that our relationship wasn’t going to be like hers and her mother’s. She believed we could avoid falling into the trap of mother, daughter, criticism and bickering. And mostly we did. But then there were those few nasty years. I didn’t hate her exactly, it just seemed at the time that everything she did bugged me; the way she was so proud of me, always wanting to be my friend; even being the kind of woman who put her family—Dad and me—first, seemed lame somehow. I know. Not cool.

  There were moments, I admit, when I was a perfectly horrible daughter and I gave her some pretty rough times back then. Now, I need her. I need her to do something for me. Something really big. I believe she would. I believe she would do anything for me—if only I could ask her.

  5

  Moving day comes too soon. One by one, the three vehicles turn west onto the highway in the fused yellow light of sunrise. Ian, driving the new Ford pickup truck, which they’d traded Julie’s Taurus in on last week, leads the parade. Behind him is Barry in his Lincoln Continental, followed by the moving van. At the wheel of the Jeep Cherokee, bringing up the rear, Julie glances over at Jessie in the passenger seat with what she hopes is a smile. “Well, this is it,” she says and pulls onto the highway.

  She’s grateful to have her sister’s company, to have someone to talk with on the drive out to the ranch. Not so long ago she would have looked forward to driving alone; she used to enjoy her solitary time behind the wheel that allowed her head to clear out all the business clutter. Now the trouble with driving in silence, like any repetitive or thoughtless activity where she lets her guard down, is that it allows her mind to wander to places she would rather not go.

  “I wonder how much Mom is spoiling the girls,” Jessie says.

  Now there’s a reliable subject. Julie and her sister can waste hours talking about their mother and never exhaust the conversation.

  “Strange how she adores her granddaughters, isn’t it?” Jessie muses. “Given how you and I just seemed to be an inconvenience, a distraction from her life with Dad, while we were growing up. Making up for lost time, I suppose.”

  “Yeah, I guess. Lucky her. A second chance,” Julie says, surprised by the harsh edge to her words. She thought she’d let go of all that. She believed that she had long ago forgiven her mother for all the times she’d chosen to accompany their father on his business trips, leaving the mothering of her children to a succession of housekeepers and babysitters.

  Determined not to commit the same mistake, Julie had taken a break from her career for five years after Darla was born. That had been one of the bonuses of switching from accounting to real estate. It had allowed her to stay home for her daughter’s early years and then to set her own hours after Darla started school.

  “Dad was Mother’s career,” Jessie says, in tune as usual with Julie’s thoughts. “Her job. Much of the time it felt like we were just a by-product of that.”

  “Ha! You think?”

  “It must have been worse for you, being the oldest. I was fortunate. I had you.”

  “Yeah, until I abandoned you when I was twenty-two,” Julie says wryly.

  “You couldn’t shake me that easy, if you recall.”

  Julie remembers. After she and Ian married, Jessie would often show up at their Vancouver apartment. And then when they moved inland she had spent her summers with them in Waverley Creek. “I couldn’t wait for the end of school every June s
o I could hop on the bus and come up to your place.”

  “And I loved those summers,” Julie says, then adds with a laugh, “I certainly understood your need to get away.”

  “Oh yeah.” Jessie reaches for the Thermos at her feet. “You know I used to imagine Mom being handed me as a newborn, taking one look at me and saying ‘What do I need another one of these for? I already have one!’” She snorts at her own joke.

  Julie glances quickly at her sister’s profile. Unlike Julie, whose appearance and height favoured their father’s side of the family, Jessie resembles their mother. Growing up, the eight years difference in their ages had left little room for jealousy or competition between them; and there’s none now. Still, Julie envies her sister’s model height and elegant figure, her slim face and high cheekbones. Although lately Julie has noticed that her own thinning face is beginning to resemble their mother’s as well, but not in a flattering way.

  “She’s lucky you can laugh about it,” Julie says concentrating again on the road.

  “Oh, it took a while, but after Dad died, I just stopped expecting her to be something she’s not. A good mother. And then she became something I didn’t expect her to be. A friend. And you have to admit she is a doting grandmother. Who knew?”

  Yes, who knew? A friend though? Julie isn’t certain she would put her mother in that category. They are more like adversaries who have come to an unspoken truce. There is nothing better than a child, which you both love, to soften previous transgressions in a relationship. The volatility of their past still makes Julie shudder. Visions of herself as a teenager screaming, “I hate you,” at her mother, filled her with shame even though she had come to recognize it for what it had been, a bid for attention, anything to have her sit up and take notice. It never worked.

  “Someone who didn’t know her then would never believe how selfish and self-centred she was,” Jessie says. “She puts on such a great sweet-little-old-lady act now.”