The Sweetgum Ladies Knit for Love (39 page)

“Please take it back,” she said.

He shook his head. “If you won’t stay, then at least take part of me with you.” He paused, his voice choked with emotion. “I love you, Camille. Maybe someday you’ll understand what that means.”

He leaned across the seat and grabbed the door handle to pull it closed. Before she could say anything, he had the car in reverse and was pulling out of the driveway.

She watched him drive away, feeling like the worst sort of traitor, knowing there was nothing else she could do. She couldn’t help how she felt about Sweetgum any more than she could help whom she loved. She hated Sweetgum as much as she loved Dante, but there was no room for compromise. It had to be one or the other. She had dreamed of escaping Sweetgum far longer than she’d loved Dante.

In the end, she’d really had no choice at all.

At the March meeting of the Sweetgum Knit Lit Society, Eugenie looked at the assembled group and wondered, not for the first time, if she’d made a critical error in judgment with the reading list. Although they still had two months and two books left in the year, she felt somehow that they were coming to an end. She wasn’t sure “Great Love Stories in Literature” had been much of a success.

“Where’s Hannah?” Merry asked, nodding toward the empty chair next to Eugenie.

“She’s at the freshman dance at the high school.”

At long last, Hannah had broken her silence and told Eugenie the whole story of her troubled relationship with Josh Hargrove. Eugenie hadn’t done much but listen and nod in the appropriate places. Hannah appeared to have worked out the problem for herself.

“I helped her pick out a dress from the shop,” Camille said.
She glanced toward Esther. “I forgot to tell you. I don’t usually charge Hannah for clothes since she’s been so good about helping out. I hope you’ll keep that arrangement in the future.”

Eugenie looked from Camille to Esther in surprise.

Esther saw her confusion and smiled. “We were going to tell you all tonight. I’ve bought Maxine’s Dress Shop from Camille.”

Exclamations of surprise sounded around the table.

“I’m leaving to go to school.” Strangely Camille didn’t look as happy as Eugenie would have expected. “I’ll be around for a few more weeks, helping Esther learn the ropes. We don’t have to say any big good-byes yet.”

“I’m speechless,” Merry said with a laugh, because clearly she wasn’t. She, too, looked from Camille to Esther in both delight and surprise. “You two sure can keep a secret.”

“I wasn’t certain I’d be able to do it,” Esther admitted, “but my house finally sold. To that James Delevan from Memphis.”

Maria gasped. “What?”

“We closed on it last week. I’m living in the condo at the lake now.”

“James Delevan?” Maria said. “Are you sure?”

“I think I know who I sold my own house to.” A bit of the old Esther reappeared in her pursed lips and short answer.

“What about Ranger?” Merry asked. “Do you have room for him at the condo?”

“He’ll have to adjust,” Esther said. “But Brody tells me that as long as I walk him twice a day, he’ll be fine.”

“Brody?” Eugenie was confused.

“The new veterinarian who took over for Dr. Everton. We’re…” Esther paused, as if searching for the right word. “We’re friends.”

No one seemed to know what to say to that. The new veterinarian must have something to do with the new, improved Esther Jackson.

“How’s Hunter, Merry?” Eugenie asked.

“Doing well. We have to take him back to Nashville periodically to the pediatric cardiologist. There may be some long-term effects on his heart, but we won’t know for sure for a while.” She looked around at the group. “Any and all prayers would be appreciated.” Her words were greeted with nods and murmurs of assent.

“Of course we’ll continue to pray for Hunter.” Eugenie decided she’d better steer the conversation back to the purpose of the meeting. “So what about the book? I thought
Pride and Prejudice
would be a group favorite. What did you all think?”

“It’s certainly the most traditional romance,” Maria said.

Merry nodded. “You know, for the first time I actually sympathized with Mrs. Bennett. After the last couple months…” She paused and took a deep breath. “Well, let’s just say I understand her anxiety about her children’s futures.”

“So love makes mothers anxious?” Eugenie asked, only partly in jest. Now that she was responsible for Hannah, she, too, had a newfound understanding of the scattered Mrs. Bennett.

“Ninety percent of the time,” Merry said with a smile. “The other ten percent it just makes us pushovers.”

“I thought Austen made a good argument that love means compromise,” Eugenie said. “Both Elizabeth and Darcy have to change before they can be together. What did you all think?”

Camille shook her head. “Happy endings are an illusion.” She tapped her copy of the book where it lay on the table. “There’s a reason they call it fiction. Even Jane Austen herself never married.”

“Yes, but she didn’t give up her belief in happy endings either,” Maria said. She looked younger for some reason, Eugenie thought. Then she realized that the streaks of gray in the other woman’s hair were gone. She wore lipstick too. A very pale pink, but definitely there. “Sometimes love is totally unexpected,” Maria added.

“Well, I, for one, have given up trying to understand anything about love,” Esther said, but her words held a note of humor rather than the defeat that hung heavy in her voice last fall. “All I can say is that I’ve learned that endings, painful as they are, can be beginnings in disguise. Someone taught me that these last few months.” She paused. “Maybe that’s what love is. Helping other people see what they need to see.”

Eugenie pondered that for a moment. “So have any of you changed your mind about your original definition of love?”

Maria nodded. “I guess I believe now that love doesn’t always have to be painful. Sometimes it’s nice.”

“I always thought love meant sacrificing everything for other people.” Camille laid her knitting on the table, her hands suddenly idle. “But there’s another kind of love. Self-love.
Sometimes”—her voice trembled—“sometimes you have to love yourself before you can love someone else.”

Clearly she was thinking of Dante Brown. Eugenie felt a wave of sympathy for the younger woman. She’d been in a similar situation years before with Paul, when they’d been young sweethearts. She hoped Camille wouldn’t need four decades to find her way back to love as Eugenie had.

“I always thought love was about doing your duty” Esther said, “but now I wonder if love isn’t more about what you give because you want to, not because you have to.”

Merry nodded in agreement. “I think I said love was overwhelming.” She paused, biting her lip, and Eugenie could tell she was struggling to control her emotions. “After the last few months, I’ll never take love for granted again.”

“What about Hannah?” Camille asked Eugenie. “Would you say her definition has changed?”

Eugenie nodded. “Yes. Although I’d say Hannah’s relationship with love is still a work in progress.”

“What about you, Eugenie?” Esther asked. “Have you changed your definition?”

Eugenie thought of the words she’d spoken before the congregation two weeks before. Her testimony had been disguised as a Minute for Mission, a regular part of the service. She’d talked about the tutoring program she ran at the library and how books had been an important part of her journey. She’d talked about how they could help an individual grow spiritually. And without
saying it in so many words, she’d asked the congregation to remember that she’d been a faithful citizen of Sweetgum, if not of a particular congregation, for many years.

She hadn’t known if it would work, but the next Sunday the offering had been up ten percent. A coincidence, most likely, but more rewarding had been Paul’s appreciation of her decision. She had accepted that in marrying a preacher, she’d committed herself to a church as well. She wasn’t naive enough to think there wouldn’t be more rough patches in the future, but she and Paul would work it out, one day at a time.

“I’ve always believed that love means doing for others. That hasn’t changed,” Eugenie said. “Although I think I have changed my mind about what I’m willing to do for the people I love.”

The others looked at her in confusion, but Eugenie decided not to offer any clarifications. It was enough that she knew what she meant.

“So let’s see your projects,” she said, ready to turn their attention to a new subject. “I thought the moss stitch had that old-fashioned feel of a Jane Austen novel. What did you think?”

The last thirty minutes of the meeting were spent admiring one another’s work. As Eugenie listened to the women’s chatter and observed their animated, smiling faces, she decided that maybe “Great Love Stories in Literature” hadn’t been a complete failure after all. Its success had come in the unexpected. In Hannah’s willingness to forgive Josh. In Esther’s choice to embrace a new life. In whatever—or whoever—had invigorated Maria. In
Camille’s difficult choice to follow her dream. In Merry’s acceptance of her imperfections as a mother. And even in Eugenie’s own willingness to sacrifice a little of her privacy for the sake of her husband.

Perhaps that was all any of them could ask of love, really. That it would help them to grow and change as their lives took them in unexpected directions. And that it would open their hearts and minds for the journey that lay ahead.