All Our Summers

by Holly Chamberlin

  Still, Sophie felt deeply embarrassed. She confessed to having had second and third thoughts about meeting Tim up until the very moment she had gotten into his car. She knew she had been wrong when she told him her parents wouldn’t notice she was gone. But she felt she had gone too far to tell Tim she had changed her mind without angering him.

  And she was still scared. “I don’t know why,” she had said to Julie just that morning. “I mean, nothing happened. Dad and Nicola found me, but . . .”

  It would take Sophie time to work through the emotional damage that had been done to her. And the threat of physical violence could be as damaging as the actual infliction of physical violence. Of that Julie had no doubt.

  But at this particular moment, Julie wanted very much to focus on the person sitting across from her.

  Now was the time for Julie and Scott to resume the conversation about their marriage.

  “My self-esteem issues this summer were triggered by your having the affair,” Julie told her husband. “But they’re my issues to deal with. I know that.”

  Scott nodded. “I was an idiot.”

  “You were.”

  “I acted badly.”

  “You did.”

  “I almost destroyed this family.”

  Destroyed . . .

  A strange and overwhelming urge descended on Julie Miller. In one swift move, she reached for the half-empty bottle of salad dressing and flung it against the wall.

  There was a moment of stunned silence. Scott’s eyes were wide. Julie’s heart was racing. But she didn’t feel bad. She felt—powerful.

  Suddenly, husband and wife burst out laughing.

  “I’m sorry,” Julie gasped. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” Scott said when he had recovered his breath. “Actually, that was pretty awesome.”

  “Yeah,” Julie added, “but why couldn’t it have been ranch dressing? Why did it have to be Catalina? I hope the color comes out of my curtains.”

  “If it doesn’t, then we’ll get new curtains.”

  Scott got up from the table. He opened his arms and waited.

  Julie got up from her seat. She allowed him to hug her. It felt strange, after so many months of physical distance, to be touched in this way. But not so strange that it didn’t also feel good.

  She tightened her arms around him.

  Chapter 133

  “Do you think you could teach me how to quilt?” Sophie asked. She had come to visit Bonnie unannounced. Bonnie was pleased. The older Sophie got, the less often she opted to spend time with her grandmother. “Is it hard?”

  “Yes, I can teach you, and no, it isn’t hard. The important thing is that you enjoy the work. If you don’t, there’s no point in learning.”

  Sophie shrugged and ran a finger along a graphic design on the quilt she had heaped on her lap. The house was warm; Bonnie supposed Sophie was holding the quilt for comfort. “I’ll think about it,” she said.

  Bonnie fought back a tear. Her granddaughter—her little Sophie! —had come so close to a dreadful danger. How had that been allowed to happen? How had such a degenerate been hired by the camp in the first place? Hadn’t anyone seen that he was bad news? And Sophie’s own parents . . .

  Well, the miserable tension between Julie and Scott this summer had prevented both from fully embracing their parental responsibilities. It was a sorry situation all around.

  But Sophie was safe now and she was talking about her frightening experience. Telling one’s story, Bonnie had learned, was an effective way to dispel or neutralize demons. Carol, too, knew that now.

  “Grandma,” Sophie said now, “why are there evil people in the world? I know that’s a rhetorical question. Or do I mean hypothetical? Anyway, why do you think there are?”

  “I don’t know,” Bonnie admitted. “Evil, or whatever you want to call it, is just part of human nature, I guess. In some people, it’s stronger than it is in others.” She knew that was an inadequate answer, but it was all she knew how to offer.

  Sophie sighed. “I miss Grandpa. He was so fun. Why did he have to die? I know. That’s another one of those questions no one really expects a good answer to but it would be really nice if you could get one.”

  “Yes,” Bonnie agreed. “It most certainly would.”

  “I think Mom still loves Dad. I know he still loves her. It’s so obvious. Anyway, at least they’re talking. Yesterday I actually heard Mom laugh for, like, the first time in forever.”

  “I’m very glad things seem to be improving,” Bonnie said carefully. She had lived too long to assume a happy conclusion to a damaged relationship. Happy endings did happen. Just not always.

  Sophie twisted to face her grandmother, the quilt still clutched in her lap. “Will your sister be okay?”

  Bonnie nodded. “Yes, it was only an anxiety attack, although a scary one. She’s going to have to address what might have caused it and learn how to keep it from happening again. To the extent that a person can control that sort of thing.”

  “Good,” Sophie said. “Aunt Carol is cool. I guess it’s Great-Aunt Carol. But I’m not sure she’d like that title. It makes her sound ancient.”

  Bonnie laughed. “She’d focus on the ‘great’ as in magnificent and be happy.”

  “What’s this?”

  Before Bonnie could stop her, Sophie reached for the notepad on the coffee table and began to read aloud what was written on the top page. “Two-week class on reentering the workforce after age fifty. Basic computer skills. Register?” Sophie looked up. “Are you looking for a job, Grandma?”

  “Thinking about it, yes.”

  “But do you have to work?” she asked with a frown.

  “It’s not only a matter of having to or not having to,” Bonnie explained. “It’s also a matter of wanting to do something meaningful with the rest of my life. I know you think of me as old, but I’m not. Okay, I’m not young, but I’m not old.”

  Sophie quirked an eyebrow. “If you say so, Grandma.”

  Bonnie laughed. “How about I make us something to eat?”

  Sophie sprang from the couch, quilt abandoned. “I thought you’d never ask!”

  Chapter 134

  Carol adjusted the pillows behind her back. No matter how many positions the bed offered—feet up; knees up; head and shoulders up—Carol was uncomfortable. That seemed about the right response to hospital life.

  There was another thing about hospitals. Being stuck in one made you think hard about the important issues. Like the fact that life was not only brief but also terrifyingly unknowable. Anything could happen at any time and it was best not to forget that—or, she supposed, to dwell on it. As with most things in life, finding the middle road was the healthiest way to proceed. Maybe not the easiest, in spite of what pop psychologists would have people believe.

  Carol’s roommate began to snore. She was not a particularly pleasant woman (at least, she hadn’t been to Carol), but in the last twenty-four hours she had been visited by her husband, her son, her daughter-in-law, and a friend. The husband had brought an enormous bouquet of carnations and he had cried openly at the sight of his wife. Before taking his leave, he had professed his love, had promised to return, and had sworn that when she came home she would find the house spotless.

  That, Carol supposed, was true love.

  Love was one of those big, important issues Carol had been thinking about since being admitted to the Yorktide hospital. The love she had. The love she had rejected.

  What was it really like to be loved, to allow oneself to be loved, like Bonnie had loved Ken and Ken had loved Bonnie? She might have known with Alex.

  Carol thought of Martin. Had she really loved him? Or had it merely been infatuation? Would she have lost interest like she had with all the others who had come before him? It was too late to know. Better to focus on what she could and did know, which was that Alex loved her—to the extent that she had let him—that Bonnie and Nicola loved
her, that she had a family she cherished. If she had come to that important realization later than most, so be it.

  Carol’s roommate switched on the television and the mind-numbing opening music of a midday game show filled the small, sterile room. Carol took a slow, deep breath. The woman had a right to watch a television program. It was not the end of the world. Still, Carol felt she would go mad if she were stuck in this place for much longer. She wanted to be home. And home was . . .

  Carol knew the answer to that question. She had known it for some time.

  She hadn’t really wanted Ferndean in the first place. She had wanted something else, something less tangible but also more real. She had wanted the love of her sister and daughter, and she had found that. Add to that the fact that she would be face-to-face with her dear Alex again before long and her life could be counted as very fortunate indeed.

  Besides, as charming as Yorktide was, there was no way she could ever live there year-round. She had only been gone from New York for a little over two months and yet she already missed the sound of heels on pavement. She missed the presence of very tall buildings. She missed bagels. Real ones. She missed the onion soup at her favorite French-style bistro, and the way her favorite waiter, an ancient gentleman, served it with such seriousness and dignity. She even missed the honking of car horns. Sort of.

  Once back in New York she would create a game plan for the coming years. She would go back to work in whatever capacity seemed right. She would—

  “Wheel of Fortune!” the roommate cried.

  Carol winced.

  Chapter 135

  “Why does it take forever to be discharged from the hospital?” Nicola wondered aloud.

  “Bureaucracy,” her mother said dryly. “Have patience.”

  Nicola turned from the room’s large window and perched next to her mother on the edge of the bed. Earlier, Carol had changed into the fresh clothes Nicola had brought from Ferndean. Bonnie had cleaned, pressed, and put away the clothing she had been wearing when she had fallen ill.

  “I’ve been thinking about what you told me when I asked about your social life,” Nicola said. “About spending a lot of time on your own. About how I do the same.”

  “Just don’t isolate yourself too much,” her mother said kindly. “Friends are important.”

  “Do as I say, not as I do?” Nicola asked with a small smile.

  “Something like that. Still, no woman is an island.”

  Nicola laughed. “I just remembered an old rhyme our housekeeper told me. ‘Make new friends but keep the old. One is silver, the other is gold.’ ”

  “Matilda had an apt phrase for every occasion.”

  “You did the right thing by sending me here to Yorktide,” Nicola said suddenly. “I was miserable in that school, with those kids, and I needed to be away from it all. Thank you for knowing that.”

  Carol shook her head. “I didn’t know for sure that I was doing the right thing. I just hoped that I was. For the both of us. We were lucky, that’s all.”

  “I’m not sure lucky is the right word. Blessed? Maybe that’s not right, either. I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

  “That day you drove away with Scott and Julie . . . Honestly, it was one of the worst days of my life.”

  Nicola gently squeezed her mother’s hand. “Mine too. I was so angry but more than that, I was scared. For the entire drive north, I fought not to burst into tears. When we got to Aunt Bonnie’s house and she met me at the door with this sympathetic smile, I pretty much collapsed into her arms.” Nicola smiled. “I think I scared her.”

  An aide appeared at the door with a wheelchair.

  “Ready to go home, Ms. Ascher?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Carol said firmly.

  “Aunt Bonnie should be out front with the car,” Nicola told her.

  Carol eased into the wheelchair. “My sister,” she said, “is a good person.”

  Nicola patted her mother’s shoulder. “I know,” she said. “And so are you.”

  Chapter 136

  “In the trash,” Julie said aloud with some satisfaction. All those articles she would never return to—and if she did want to reread one or two, no doubt she could find them online.

  Four large trash and recycling bags stood—or slumped—on the floor of Julie’s office. Already the space looked larger and most definitely cleaner. A new start.

  And not only for Julie Miller. Carol was going home today. Well, back to Ferndean House at least. As far as Julie knew, her aunt was still intent upon staying in Yorktide, but she wouldn’t be totally surprised if Carol had changed her mind.

  Whatever Carol decided to do, her presence in Yorktide this summer had helped Julie return to herself. Was that the best way to put it? Maybe she could say instead that Carol had inspired her to remember that she had value as an individual, apart from her role as wife and mother and daughter.

  And she had been thinking about her aunt’s offer of her apartment. It would be a dream come true in some ways, three or four days on her own in New York City, able to come and go as she pleased, an anonymous observer, independent of her identity as one of Yorktide’s own. Yes, Julie thought as she tossed an ancient, inkless pen into a trash bag, once Carol was settled she would approach her about using the apartment.

  She might also tell her aunt that she had applied for the Ackroyd Institute’s scholarship. She had never thought she might one day visit the Windy City. Who knew what other destinations she might one day explore?

  Julie eyed the framed image of a bunch of tulips that had hung on the wall next to the old filing cabinet for as long as she could remember. It was dingy and yellowed. Within a moment, the frame was off the wall, the image ripped out, crumpled, and thrown into a bag of recycling.

  Maybe it was this last gesture that called Julie’s attention to the fact that her wedding ring was no longer embedded in her finger. In fact, it turned easily now and with only a slight tug, Julie slipped the ring past her knuckle.

  She wasn’t aware that she had lost weight, but she must have. She had been more physically active in the last two weeks than she had been for months. She hadn’t felt the awful need to overeat until she was senseless.

  She wanted her wits about her. She had missed them.

  Julie pushed the ring back to the bottom of her finger. She didn’t need the ring to come off, not any longer. It didn’t feel like the shackle it had only weeks ago; it didn’t feel like a mocking reminder of the ruin that was her marriage. Her marriage was not a ruin.

  Julie heard Scott’s car pulling up the drive. She realized she was smiling.

  Chapter 137

  Bonnie was waiting just outside the main entrance to the hospital. When Nicola emerged from the building on her own, her heart leapt to her mouth. “Where’s your mother?” she asked. “Is everything all right?”

  Nicola smiled. “Fine. Mom decided she needed to pee before the ride home. The aide will bring her down in a few minutes.”

  “Good. For a moment . . .” Bonnie shook her head. “Never mind.”

  Nicola put her arm through her aunt’s. “While we’re waiting,” she said, “I might as well tell you I’ve come to an important decision. I’ve decided not to apply to the Peace Corps, and I took a leave of absence from Pine Hill. I’m going to spend the next months with my parents. Mom and I are going to Buenos Aires to see my father.”

  “I think that’s a wonderful idea!” Bonnie looked with misty eyes at her niece. “I’ll miss you, we all will, but what you’re doing is very generous.”

  Nicola shrugged. “I don’t know about that. I mean, Mom and Alex did give me my life. And this summer I realized that I’ve always loved my mother, I mean really loved her, even when I felt hurt and rejected and angry. She was there for me those first important years of my life. She took good care of me and honestly, for a long time I was very happy.”

  Bonnie felt a twinge of jealousy. But that was normal.

  “Please don’t think I�
��m not grateful for what you and Ken did for me,” Nicola went on. “I am. More than you’ll ever know. But my parents need me right now and I’m going to do whatever I can for them. It’s going to be a very bittersweet time for Mom and Alex.”

  For a moment, Bonnie couldn’t speak. Her niece was such a fine young woman. Finally, she said, “You’ll take good care of yourself, won’t you? It will be hard on you, too, in ways neither of us can probably imagine.”

  Nicola smiled. “I’ll be fine. I’m tough.”

  “You’re your mother’s daughter.”

  “And your niece.”

  “But no one gets through the tough times all on her own.”

  “Mom said something like that to me. About the importance of friends. She warned me not to isolate myself, like she has in her own life.”

  “Speak of the devil!” Bonnie grinned.

  A small crowd had begun to gather in the wake of Carol Ascher’s wheelchair, old-timers and young staff, all saying farewell to Yorktide’s Golden Girl.

  “Always the center of attention,” Bonnie said fondly.

  Nicola laughed. “She’s a natural.”

  Chapter 138

  “I’ll leave you two alone now,” Judith said, reaching for her canvas bag. She had been waiting for the sisters at Ferndean. Once Carol was safely inside, Judith had bustled about fetching her cousin a cold drink and a bowl of fruit salad she had whipped up and a stack of paperback novels to the point where Carol had begun to feel exhausted just watching her.

  Finally, Judith was gone, leaving Carol enthroned in her father’s armchair and watching Bonnie, now also in Florence Nightingale mode, fetching more things that Carol didn’t need, like a box of tissues, and more things Carol didn’t want, like a cup of tea with two sugars, and generally being sweetly annoying with her solicitations.

  “Are you sure you’re warm enough?” Bonnie asked for about the fourth time in the past fifteen minutes.

  Carol sighed. “Bonnie, I’m fine. Stop fussing and sit down.”