The Christmas Boutique

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  Mary Beth pressed her lips together as her gaze took in the dismayingly altered storefront, and the large window that had once boasted an enticing display of quilts, fabrics, books, and notions, which changed with the seasons, now darkened and covered with construction permits. Her heart cinched at the sight of the faint discoloration of the stone above the door where the red-and-gold Grandma’s Attic sign had hung proudly for so many years.

  She had once enjoyed shopping at Waterford’s only independent quilt shop, her step quickening with anticipation the moment she put hand to doorknob. A bell on the door would tinkle merrily overhead as she entered, and the owner, Bonnie Markham, would glance up from the cutting table or the cash register and smile in welcome. Warm folk music—hammered dulcimer, guitar, violin, and flute—played softly over hidden speakers, and the faint aromas of cinnamon and coffee wafted on the air, perhaps from an office in the back. Mary Beth had found great pleasure and inspiration wandering the aisles of Grandma’s Attic through the years. It was impossible to count how many of her favorite quilts owed their existence to a new technique she had observed Bonnie demonstrating or to a particularly evocative fabric that sparked her imagination.

  But then, inexplicably, Bonnie had hired Diane Sonnenberg to work at the shop—Diane Sonnenberg, of all people, Mary Beth’s next-door neighbor and archnemesis, a quilter of marginal talent and abrasive personality who had somehow managed to befriend some of the most prestigious quilters in the Elm Creek Valley. Although their sons had been best friends since the second grade, and Mary Beth’s husband got along well with Diane’s husband, Tim, a chemistry professor at Waterford College, Mary Beth and Diane had a history of enmity, the result of disputes over property boundaries and noise ordinance violations that had turned bitterly personal. Mary Beth didn’t trust Diane to cut her fabric accurately or to withhold snide remarks about her color choices, so if she glanced through the front window and saw Diane inside, carrying on as if she actually deserved to be there, Mary Beth would walk on by and come back another day. Diane’s presence was inconvenient and annoying, and it was difficult not to take it personally that Mary Beth herself had submitted a résumé soon after the shop opened and had received nothing more than Bonnie’s promise that she would keep it on file.

  Bonnie must have hired Diane out of pity. Why else would she have overlooked Mary Beth, the infinitely more qualified applicant? She had won scores of ribbons at the Waterford Summer Quilt Festival through the years and at the time had recently been reelected as president of the Waterford Quilting Guild. Diane was only an ordinary member of middling ability who had served on the refreshments committee once but seemed disinclined to seek a more demanding leadership role.

  If only Diane had never joined the guild, how much better everything would have worked out for everyone.

  Mary Beth would never forget how shocked and dismayed she had felt when Diane had first shown up at a guild meeting, strolling into Meeting Room C of the Waterford Public Library as a guest of longtime member Agnes Emberly. Afterward Diane had submitted a registration form, but since nothing in the bylaws permitted the president to veto applicants at will, and since Diane was apparently Agnes’s protégé, Mary Beth had had no choice but to grit her teeth and accept her application. The guild was large enough that they could avoid each other without drawing attention to their mutual antipathy, and after a few weeks passed and Diane remained well outside the periphery of Mary Beth’s inner circle, she was satisfied that her obnoxious neighbor knew her place and would keep to it.

  How wrong she had been.

  Mary Beth had barely let down her guard when Diane announced her intention to challenge her for the guild presidency, showing no respect for more than a hundred years of tradition in which incumbents were allowed to run uncontested, retaining their posts until they voluntarily stepped down or died in office. Worse yet, Diane actively campaigned at guild meetings, buttonholing members as they arrived and departed, haranguing others with a stump speech throughout the refreshment break.

  “The guild desperately needs change,” Mary Beth overheard Diane tell Gwen Sullivan and her auburn-haired daughter, Summer, a student at Waterford College, as they helped themselves to cookies and coffee at the snack table. “Under the current regime, it’s become cliquish and moribund.”

  “Has it?” asked Gwen, raising her eyebrows, but she seemed amused rather than offended.

  “‘Current regime’?” Summer echoed. “That seems kind of harsh.”

  “Harsh but true,” said Diane. “The officers invite the same handful of local speakers every year. They run the same block swaps. They hang the same quilters’ quilts at the Waterford Summer Quilt Festival. The guild’s creativity has stagnated so much that I can predict within a tiny margin of error which guild members will bring what dishes to the holiday socials and potluck picnics.”

  When Gwen laughed, Mary Beth felt the blood rush into her face. “Hello,” she said sharply. “Standing right here. You know I can hear you, right?”

  Gwen and Summer had the decency to look chagrined, but Diane merely shrugged. “Sorry, Mary Beth, but I’ve pointed out these problems before and you haven’t done anything to solve them. Maybe you can hear me, but I’m not sure you’re listening.”

  Furious, Mary Beth strode back to the podium to call the meeting to order. She was too disconcerted to respond properly that night, but at every subsequent meeting, she made sure to promote her own candidacy whenever she could slip it unobtrusively into the program. She had the microphone and the bully pulpit; why not use them? Naturally Diane complained that this wasn’t fair, and when she had the nerve to demand equal time, the guild voted to allow both candidates to make a speech to the entire group on election night before ballots were cast.

  The decision stung and smacked of disloyalty, but when Mary Beth vented to her husband, Roger sighed wearily and said, “They’re probably just trying to be fair to both sides.”

  “Or they want to give the appearance of fairness.” Perhaps Mary Beth’s friends were so confident she would win that they saw no harm in letting Diane speak her piece.

  The night of the election came. Mary Beth had her hair styled and wore her most flattering professional outfit. Diane, unfortunately, looked as she always did—slim, tall, gorgeous for her age, with curly blond hair that fell effortlessly in place and a sense of fashion that her peers admired and even their teenage daughters complimented. Fortunately, in that particular forum, substance was far more important than style.

  Diane was allowed to speak first. She used her time onstage to spout platitudes she had probably picked up watching presidential election coverage on local television. New leadership would bring a change of pace and fresh ideas, she said. If she were elected, she would invite better speakers, arrange new workshops, spend members’ dues more frugally and with more accountability, and so on and so forth. It was all nonsense. Anyone who had lived next door to that woman as long as Mary Beth had—and that was too long—knew that Diane had the attention span of a puppy and couldn’t possibly deliver on any of her promises.

  But, she realized bleakly, she was the only person in that room who had ever lived next door to Diane.

  Hiding her sudden fear as the applause for her rival faded, Mary Beth realized her only hope was to be concise, focused, and merciless. She took the podium and, after the preliminary niceties, she launched into a description of the achievements of her previous administrations, but only the most important, in the interest of brevity. “For the benefit of my opponent,” she continued, holding up her own well-read copy of the official guild handbook, “who may not be aware of what is required of the president, I will now read the president’s official duties from the bylaws.”

  A ripple of surprise passed through the audience. Diane had returned to her seat, and Mary Beth noted with satisfaction that she glanced to her friends for reassurance, but did not seem to find any.

  “‘The president shall prepare the agenda for and preside a
t quilt guild meetings and shall direct such meetings in a pleasant and professional manner,’” Mary Beth said, and then bit her lower lip and winced. Everyone knew Diane’s default mode was virulent sarcasm.

  “‘The president shall appoint committee chairpersons and coordinate the activities of all the committees.’” With a sharp intake of breath, she glanced up from the handbook and frowned, feigning worry. Diane could barely keep her purse organized.

  “‘The president shall be authorized to cosign checks on behalf of the guild.’” Mary Beth arched her eyebrows in warning, for Diane rarely managed to pay her own member dues on time.

  “‘The president shall appoint an ad hoc committee to help coordinate all necessary activities for producing a quilt show.’” Mary Beth set down the guild bylaws and shook her head. “Oh, honestly, ladies, need I go on? Would any of us feel comfortable entrusting our beloved Waterford Summer Quilt Festival to someone who has never won a ribbon?”

  A murmur of dismay swept through the audience. One of Diane’s friends squeezed her shoulder, a brief gesture of encouragement, but Mary Beth felt a surge of triumph, knowing she had won even before the first ballot was cast. When the votes were tallied and her reelection confirmed, relief flooded her with such force that she did not trust her trembling legs to support her weight. She had to accept her friends’ congratulations perched on a chair. Afterward, Diane left the meeting hall so quickly that Mary Beth barely had a chance to enjoy watching her go.

  She savored her victory, but only briefly, because Diane ruined that too. Diane dropped out of the guild, which would have been glorious except that she took her closest friends with her, which included some of the guild’s most talented and dedicated members. Bonnie owned the only quilt shop in town, Gwen published academic research on quilt history, Summer was regarded as a quilting prodigy who represented the guild’s future, and Agnes was a master of appliqué who unfailingly contributed the work of four quilters to the guild’s service projects. As a distraction, Mary Beth encouraged her own friends to spread rumors that Diane had blackmailed them into leaving. In the frenzy of speculation that followed, everyone forgot the ludicrous claims Diane had raised in her campaign about the so-called problems that allegedly threatened the guild’s long-term survival.

  After that, things should have settled comfortably back to normal, but they hadn’t. Mary Beth never forgave Diane for stirring up so much conflict and threatening her position. She wished the Sonnenbergs would move far away and leave the neighborhood in peace, but apparently she was cursed with Diane the way other people were stuck with miserable allergies or chronic lower back pain. She could not get rid of Diane permanently, but could only try to keep the symptoms from spreading.

  That proved more challenging than she anticipated, especially after Diane and her friends teamed up with the renowned Sylvia Bergstrom Compson to create Elm Creek Quilts. Factions existed in the guild—small and fragmented, but a significant presence nonetheless—who thought the burgeoning company was a wonderful addition to the local quilting community and spoke reverently of events they had attended at the manor. When Elm Creek Quilt Camp was in its third year, Mary Beth and her vice president considered adding a guild-wide boycott to the bylaws, but others on the executive board pointed out the rule would be difficult to enforce and might upset a sizable voting bloc. Because now, thanks to Diane, they had voting blocs, and in addition to her great many other concerns, Mary Beth had to worry about satisfying an electorate.

  Since declaring a boycott of all things Elm Creek would probably backfire, Mary Beth had settled for passive resistance, ignoring invitations to events at Elm Creek Manor and taking her business to Fabric Warehouse and mail-order companies rather than Grandma’s Attic. Fortunately, since all guild correspondence was sent to the Callahan home, she could filter out flyers and invitations from Elm Creek Quilts before the other members discovered their existence.

  Eventually the tumult subsided and Mary Beth was able to restore order. All was well for several years, and would have remained so if Diane had learned her lesson and had kept her distance instead of sneaking into a guild meeting and luring Mary Beth away from the podium just long enough to make that wretched announcement that had thrown everything into chaos—

  Mary Beth inhaled deeply, shakily. She was doing precisely what she could not allow herself to do. She could not blame Diane for what had happened next, for the way things had gone so shockingly, tragically wrong, or why.

  The stoplight turned green. Gaze fixed on the road ahead, Mary Beth drove on, past the former quilt shop and future location of University Realty’s new offices. No wonder the real estate company had raised the rents after they had purchased the building; they had coveted that prime location for themselves. Mary Beth knew the interior designer they had hired and had heard that they were sparing no expense in their remodel. Out with the warm and cozy quilt shop; in with the finest furnishings and state-of-the-art integrated technology. Although Mary Beth had stubbornly, spitefully taken her business elsewhere for the past few years, she ached with longing for Grandma’s Attic now that it was gone.

  If only she had made it clear that her argument was with Diane, not with all the Elm Creek Quilters. If only she had not spoken so disparagingly about Elm Creek Quilts so often around the dinner table, when really her biggest gripe with the company was that they allowed Diane to be a part of it. If only Brent had not absorbed her carelessly contemptuous words and acted upon them in ways she never would have imagined possible—

  She blinked her eyes furiously to clear away tears. It pained her that she could pinpoint the precise moment when she had steered events inexorably toward disaster, and yet could do nothing to change them.

  It all came down to that letter from Elm Creek Quilts.

  In January—had it really been almost a year?—the Elm Creek Quilters had sent out letters asking Sylvia Bergstrom Compson’s friends, family, former students, and admirers to contribute blocks to her wedding quilt. Six-inch blocks were requested, patchwork or appliqué, in cotton fabrics from a palette of green, rose, lilac, blue, and ecru. The submission deadline was April 1, and participants were encouraged to “choose any pattern that represents how Sylvia has influenced you as an artist, a teacher, or a friend.”

  It was a wonderful idea, the sort of project quilters eagerly embraced, especially when the intended recipient was as universally beloved and admired as Sylvia. If Diane had not been involved, Mary Beth would have read the letter aloud at the next meeting of the Waterford Quilting Guild and would have encouraged everyone to participate. She would have sewn a block herself—Wedding March, perhaps, or Bride’s Bouquet. But when Mary Beth spied Diane’s name in the letter, her instinctive reaction was indignant outrage. How dare those Elm Creek Quilters expect their members to contribute to this quilt when not one of them deigned to join the guild? How dare they contact the Waterford Quilting Guild at all after quitting in a huff in the aftermath of Diane’s failed coup?

  “Those Elm Creek Quilters think their time is more valuable than ours,” she fumed to Roger and Brent that evening over a dinner of broccoli, cheese, and rice casserole. “They think we have nothing better to do than sew blocks for some stupid bridal quilt. Don’t they know we make a quilt a year for a real charity? They ought to try giving back to the community for a change, but with them it’s just take, take, take.”

  “They make quilts for hospitals,” said Brent. “I heard Mrs. Sonnenberg talking about it once. They make quilts for the kids’ cancer ward at Hershey Medical Center and for the neonatal unit at the Elm Creek Valley Hospital.”

  Mary Beth bristled, but as ever, she instinctively softened her tone when she spoke to her son. “Then they ought to understand how much work is involved in a project like this.”

  “They’re just asking for one quilt square,” said Roger, without looking up from his plate. “It doesn’t sound like that much effort.”

  Mary Beth glared. “It’s not the effort. It’s the p
rinciple.” How could he not see that? Her glare relented when she turned to her son. “Honey, I’m sure you know better than to mention this conversation to Mrs. Sonnenberg.”

  Brent shrugged and nodded. Of course he would never tell tales on her to that conniving shrew next door, even though she was the mother of his best friend.

  What a difference it would have made if Mary Beth had allowed her temper to cool; if she had reflected upon the bride and groom and the good intentions behind the Elm Creek Quilters’ request; if she had considered the many members of her guild who adored Sylvia and would have been eager to contribute to her bridal quilt. Then she might have set aside her personal issues with Diane, put the letter in her satchel with the other guild business, and read the request for blocks aloud at the next meeting. But instead she tucked the letter into a filing cabinet in her quilt room.

  Even then, if she had just left it there, it would not have been too late to avert disaster. Why hadn’t she just let it go? But although Mary Beth had put the letter out of sight, it had remained firmly fixed in her mind. She fumed whenever she saw Diane, which was far too often, an inescapable consequence of living next door. She was tempted to send Sylvia an anonymous letter spoiling the surprise, but although that might give Mary Beth a moment of satisfaction, it would do nothing to establish clear boundaries between her guild and the Elm Creek Quilters. Eventually, after finding it impossible to simply let the matter drop, Mary Beth decided to return the letter to the sender and explain that in the future they were to regard her guild as strictly off-limits.

  She waited until the first day of March, exactly one month before the quilt blocks were due—too late for the Elm Creek Quilters to contact guild members individually for them to make the submission deadline, but just early enough to make them feel obliged to make the attempt.

  Mary Beth had remained on relatively good terms with Bonnie, so she decided to return the letter to her at Grandma’s Attic, a safe, public place if not quite neutral territory. To her dismay, when she entered the shop, the only employees in sight were Diane and Summer, who were sorting a bin of mail on the cutting table but glanced up at the sound of the door chime. Stalling for time, Mary Beth removed her hat, smoothed back her platinum-blond pageboy, and, addressing neither of them in particular, asked, “Isn’t Bonnie here today?”