Kate Jacobs (17 page)

* * *

James nodded to himself as he remembered her
words, stepping out of the subway on 72nd Street and walking up Central Park
West. The weather was getting so warm he didn't really need his jacket; it was
a late Easter this year and April was already winding down. Georgia having
graciously agreed to invite him over for lamb, he was looking forward to
telling Anita that he would see her for dinner the following Sunday, eager to
get Anita's input on what sort of gifts he should bring. He was wary of going
overboard yet again. A lily bouquet, for sure, but should he bring two
chocolate rabbits or just one? And what about a new Easter outfit? When he was
growing up, he had always received a crisp new shirt and pair of pants on
Easter morning, his sisters getting new frilly pastel dresses, the entire
Foster clan gussying up until they were the most handsome bunch ever to appear
at the First Baptist Church in Baltimore. Come to think of it, should he ask to
take Dakota to a service? Not like he had been to church in years, but still.
Maybe he should.
James waited as the doorman called up to Anita, then received the nod to
proceed. Anita stood in the open doorway as he approached.
"Hello, James," she said. Her voice was strained. "Come
in."
James stepped through the threshold, getting a better look at Anita as he came
closer. Her lipstick was feathering at the corners and her shoulders drooped
ever so slightly.
"Come in," she repeated. "I'm glad you're here, but I'm just a
little tired."
"No worries, Anita, let's go have a sit-down."
James took her hand and led her gently to the sofa, for once being in charge
instead of the other way around. His mind flashed quickly on his parents,
worrying for a moment about his father getting up on a ladder to empty the
eaves troughs as part of spring cleaning. They were all getting older.
"Hold on," he said, then walked back toward the bedrooms. He
hesitated, only briefly, then stepped into the master. It was scrupulously
neat, the king-sized bed made up with dozens of silk pillows. His eyes caught
what he was looking for: a soft, sage-green afghan resting on the footboard.
James picked it up and carried it out to Anita, who was almost dozing on the
sofa.
"Oh, excuse me." She perked up at the sight of him, but only for a
moment. "I didn't sleep very well last night."
James lifted her feet up on the sofa as she made clucking sounds of protest,
then just gave up as he covered her with the afghan she had knitted years ago.
"I'm so sorry about this, James, I should have called," she said, her
eyes barely open. "It's all rather embarrassing."
"I'll see you Sunday, Anita," he said. "I'm coming to Georgia's
for Easter dinner."
"I'm so glad, James, so very glad that you'll be there." And then she
was out, asleep and peaceful. James pulled up the afghan gently so it was
resting under her chin. He didn't want her to be too cool. For a moment, he
stood still, watching the older woman who had looked after his family all these
years, then quietly made his exit. In the elevator, he pulled out his cell
phone and scrolled through his contact list, hitting the dial button as he
stepped out on the sidewalk.
"Hello, Mom?" he said as he strolled to the subway, his sports coat
over his arm. "I was just wondering how you are…"

* * *

Georgia slowly put down the phone in her
office, then walked over to look at the knitted gown on her dressmaker's model.
Damn, did her body hurt! It had taken six weeks from that first meeting, but it
was finally finished, every stray end sewn in, the final product blocked and
steamed. Gorgeous. Cat hadn't even seen it yet—Georgia had been expecting her
to drop by in a few hours, after her Tuesday afternoon Pilates class. So she
was surprised that Cat had just called, even more taken aback with what she had
to say.
"I positively adore the direction we're going," Cat told her,
"but on second thought, the gown might look better in a light pink instead
of gold. Metallic but not so shimmery. Something softer, more feminine. Don't
you think so?"
No, thought Georgia, I don't think so. Exasperated, she blurted out a sum to
remake the dress that was astronomical, mainly to deter Cat from wanting them
to start over. Couldn't that spoiled socialite see how difficult it would be to
complete in time for the museum gala?
"That's fine—we're going to need it quickly," Cat answered, unfazed,
as always, at amounts of money that Georgia felt embarrassed just saying aloud.
"And we'll need all new accessories, too. I think we ought to step up our
meetings. Are you free tomorrow?"
"I have to check my calendar," Georgia retorted, frustrated that Cat
seemed to think she was always on call and always available. There
are
no knitting emergencies, she had told her former best friend during one
late-night phone conversation. Though they had ended up talking for such a long
time that it had actually been quite fun, chatting as they once used to do
daily in their teens. But not now. No, at the moment, Cat was in full-on
lady-who-lunches mode, filled with ideas and details and all manner of demands.
Georgia was dazed by the prospect of making another gown over the next few
weeks—Cat had changed her mind so many times during the creation of the first
one, and she couldn't bear to remake the pattern again. But good money was hard
to refuse.
"Anita," she called out wearily, standing in the doorway of her
office. "I think I'm going to need some help here."

* * *

"I just don't think I can do it,"
Georgia found herself telling Anita when the day was done and she was tallying
up the register. "It's like she's punishing me. Trying to prove how rich
she is or something."
Anita tilted her head as though considering what her friend was saying but
didn't speak a word.
"It's not right," Georgia whined. "I'm tired. And I have to
roast a lamb for Sunday."
"Well, surely you won't be putting it in the oven yet, love," Anita
replied. "It's only Tuesday."
"I told her it would cost fifteen thousand dollars—and that I might have
to do some machine knitting to get it done." Georgia spoke in a low voice
even though no one else was in the store. "And she agreed to pay it. Just
like that."
"Fifteen thousand dollars?" Anita repeated calmly as Georgia nodded.
"Tell me again about what happened in high school," she prodded, then
listened intently to the tale of how Georgia passed on Dartmouth to go to the
same school as Cathy and her shock at learning that Cathy's name had come up on
the waitlist and that she'd taken Georgia's place at the Ivy, without breathing
a word of it.
"And we never spoke again until she showed up here and whipped out her
checkbook," Georgia finished, her voice trembling ever so slightly.
The older woman reached out and led the way to the back of the office. The
twosome settled on the worn loveseat wedged into the corner opposite Georgia's
desk, which was covered in invoices and yarn samples.
"The thing is," Anita began quietly, "that when you're young,
you always think you'll meet all sorts of wonderful people, that drifting apart
and losing friends is natural. You don't worry, at first, about the friends you
leave behind. But as you get older, it gets harder to build friendships. Too
many defenses, too little opportunity. You get busy. And by the time you realize
that you've lost the dearest best friend you've ever had, years have gone by
and you're mature enough to be embarrassed by your attitude and, frankly, by
your arrogance."
Smiling at Georgia, Anita spoke softly. "Why do you think Cat Phillips
would want a second dress made? With all the accessory-shopping afternoons and
all that?"
"Because she's a bitch!"
"Okay. She's a bitch with too much time on her hands," said Anita.
"Or maybe because she has something to say, but she doesn't know how to
start." Her arms wrapped around her dear protégé, Anita continued.
"I don't claim to know the woman and her motivations, Georgia, but it
seems to me that she's just looking for an excuse to spend time together, and
you—yes, you!—are so damn valuable to her that she's willing to pay any amount
just to have your attention."
"Ha! I don't think so!"
"I do. I think if I'd lost a friend like you, I'd go on missing you for a
long, long time." Anita gave a gentle tug on a curl.
"Why is this all happening?" Georgia moaned. "Why are they all
coming back now? First James, now Cathy. And suddenly the business is booming.
And you're making videos with Lucie! It's all too much going on—it's not the
right time. I'm not ready!"
"We're making videos, dearest, you and me." Anita held Georgia close
as she sniffled. "And there's always a better time than right now and
there always will be. But right now is what we've got."
"I don't want them around!" Georgia insisted.
"I know, sweetie, I know. It would be so much easier if you really didn't
care." Anita hated to see Georgia upset, but at the same time her heart
expanded with the satisfaction of being needed. Her daughter of the heart.
"Sometimes God answers a prayer you didn't know you had," she
continued, thinking to herself of the day when she met Georgia in the park.
Georgia's response was inaudible.
"I missed her." Georgia's voice was less than a whisper. "All
this time, I missed Cathy. I wanted to get in touch with her so many times over
the past twenty years—but fear of seeming pathetic always stopped me," she
said. "'Hey, still mad about the Dartmouth thing. But boy-o-boy, I sure do
miss you. Won't you be my friend again?'" She shrugged her shoulders.
"See what I mean? Stupid. Sillier as you get older. Even if it's the truth."
Georgia threw back her head of curls and exhaled loudly. She stood up, giving
Anita a thank-you squeeze on the arm as she did so, and squared her shoulders.
The tough cookie, Georgia Walker, was back.
"Now she's rich and I'm Cinderella, dressing her for the ball. And if I
don't get started right away, I'm going to turn into a pumpkin, too."

ten

"Help! Someone take this from me,"
puffed K.C. as she
nearly dropped her veggie lasagna through the door of the shop at 8:55
P.M., the last member of the Friday Night Knitting Club to show up.
"You went home and cooked? I don't believe it." Georgia took the warm
Tupperware dish from her friend.
K.C. looked Georgia squarely in the eye. "I turned on the stove and heated
up this sucker. Which, if you want to know, has its own particular
challenges."
Georgia laughed as she walked K.C. over to the big table in the shop. It wasn't
that surprising, in a tiny NYC kitchen, to never actually turn on the stove.
Before Dakota was born, Georgia had never cooked anything other than pasta in
her apartment share. After Dakota, well, it had just been too pricey to do
takeout. And it's not like babies can be raised on pizza by the slice.
Toddlers, perhaps. Of course, by the time Dakota was a toddler, Georgia had
learned how to cook. And do the books. And run a store while keeping an eye on
her little one playing in the yarns. Now her baby girl stood before her,
backpack over her shoulder, waiting for her sleepover date to pick her up.
Georgia had fallen short of the good-mom award tonight, having earlier fed
Dakota a tuna sandwich instead of a home-cooked meal. It was really going to be
a grown-up evening.
"Wow," said Georgia, surveying the food on the table. Lucie had
carried in a cake that didn't have that distinctive scent of cake mix. (Maybe
it really was homemade?) Darwin had brought bags of pre-washed salad and
plastic bowls and forks (but no dressing, Georgia noticed; she would have to
run upstairs and get something from her own fridge). And Georgia—although
worried about the idea of having a dinner party in her shop—had even made some
chicken-and-red-pepper kebabs for the shindig.
Georgia marveled at how Dakota's idea of sharing snacks had been the seed for
this potluck-dinner concept. Secretly, Georgia was glad she'd gone along with
the idea, feeling rather pleased and proud to have assembled such a great group
of women, cooks and
noncooks
alike. Though the timing
could have been better, wedged between the week's Seders and Easter coming up
on Sunday. Georgia noticed that only the true die-hard regulars had shown up:
Darwin, Lucie, K.C., and Anita, who had quietly excused herself after Shabbat
dinner with her sons and their families and walked over. Hers had never been a
particularly religious home; her oldest, Nathan, had married into a far more
observant family and Anita often found her daughter-in-law's presence in the
kitchen stressful. ("I just wanted to see how it's going," she
whispered to Georgia when she arrived a short time ago. "Also, I got a little
tired of you-know-who and her insistence on eating off paper plates because I'm
not kosher enough.")
Georgia heard the zip of a bag being opened and saw K.C. pull out a bottle—no,
make that three bottles—of Chianti.
"I didn't make this either, sport," she said with a wink at Georgia.
"Ladies, let's start our engines."
"Just a drop for me—it's Passover," started Anita, though she still
took the full glass offered by the evening's sommelier. Darwin began passing
the wine around, discreetly skipping Lucie, who was dressed, as usual, in a
very baggy sweater.
"Attention, attention. I have an announcement. I'm quitting
publishing," said K.C.
"But you don't actually have a job, do you?" Trust Darwin to say the
wrong thing, thought Georgia.
"No,
honeybuns
, I don't. I've been unemployed
for months. That's just the point." K.C. made a show of taking a seat.
"I thought I'd take it easy for a while. Get off my duff. But now it's
time for my second act."
"As what?" asked Lucie, more intrigued by the idea of reinvention
than she wanted to let on.
"That's just it." K.C. heaved a sigh. "I haven't a fucking clue.
I always wanted to be a lawyer, but I'm worried it's too late for school. So if
you have any suggestions, don't hold back. Okay, who wants some of my
not-quite-homemade lasagna? It was very expensive at
Zabar's
,
I'll have you know."
The women sat down and filled their plates, undressed lettuce and all. The
kebabs were a hit, Georgia was pleased to see. So was the wine. "K.C., you
brought so much," she told her friend, sotto voce. "You didn't have
to spend like this."
"It's part of my last hurrah," explained K.C. "If I don't figure
out things soon, I'm going to be so broke I'll have to go from couch to
couch."
Their attention shifted as Anita returned from upstairs with the salad
dressing, an extra wine bottle in tow.
"This really warms you up," she told Lucie. "Don't you want
any?"
"She's allergic…to grapes," interjected Darwin with lightning speed,
then turned on her official professorial drone. "Grapes are a very interesting
fruit, in fact, coming in many different varieties and shapes…"
As if on cue, K.C. rolled her eyes to Anita and changed the subject. Which was
good because Darwin didn't really know a damn thing about grapes.