Vows (43 page)

 
"We've never been particularly close, have we, Emily? Perhaps that's my fault." She continued holding Emily's hand, a familiarity she had never promoted in eighteen years of mothering. It felt unnatural, even now, but she forced it, admitting her own maternal shortcomings. "But you were always so taken by your father, trailing after him, imitating him. I can see that you're hurting terribly each time you shun him … and Fannie, too. You have become very close to Fannie, haven't you?"

 
Emily swallowed, refusing to lift her eyes. Two spots of color rose in her cheeks.

 
"I think it's time you were told some things. They may not be pleasant for you to hear, but I trust you to understand. You're a mature young woman, about to embark on marriage yourself. If you're old enough for that you're old enough to understand how it is with your father and me."

 
Emily's troubled blue eyes lifted. "Mama, I—"

 
"Shh. I tire so easily, and I must whisper. Please listen." Oddly enough, though Josephine had not spoken this long or this uninterruptedly in months, she neither flagged nor coughed, but went on as if some all-caring benefactor had lent her the strength to speak when she most needed it.

 
"Your father and I grew up much as you and Charles have, knowing each other from childhood. Our parents told us when we were fourteen years old that they had agreed upon a marriage convenant, which they expected the two of us to honor. It had nothing to do with the joining of lands, or of business, which has often made me wonder why they wanted so badly for Edwin and me to marry. Perhaps only because they were friends and knew what kind of children they had turned out—honest Christian children who would grow up to be honest Christian parents, and into whom the Fourth Commandment had been drilled.

 
"Our betrothal became official when we were sixteen—the same spring that Fannie came home from two years of studying abroad. Her parents threw a party right after she got back, and I recall the night clearly. It was April and the lilacs were blooming. Fannie wore ivory—she always looked stunning in ivory, with that blazing orange hair of hers—rather like a holiday candle, I always thought. I guess I realized from that first night that your father had eyes for Fannie. They danced a quadrille, and I recall them spinning with their arms linked, studying each other with flushed faces and smiling the way I'd never had Edwin smile at me. I suspect he took her outside and kissed her later in the herb garden because I could smell crushed basil on his clothes when he returned.

 
"I knew after that that I should free him from his betrothal vow, but I was not the most marriageable girl in Boston, nor the prettiest. I could not flirt like Fannie, or … or kiss in the herb garden … or carry on idle banter the way young swains like a girl to do. But more importantly, I had been raised to believe I must honor the wishes of my father and mother."

 
Josephine drew a sigh and fell back, fixing her eyes on the ceiling. "Unfortunately, so had Edwin. I knew that he was falling in love with Fannie, and I saw the strain it put on him. But I suspect his parents put him out of mind of breaking off our betrothal. So when the time came, he dutifully married me.

 
"I want you to understand, Emily…" Josephine still held her daughter's hand loosely on the coverlet. "Our marriage has not been intolerable … not even bad, but neither has it been the splendid thing it might have been had we shared the feelings that your father and Fannie did. We understood the limitations of our love. Call it respect, that's a truer word, for I always knew that the one Edwin truly loved was Fannie. Oh, he hid it well, and he never guessed that I suspected. But I knew the reason we left Massachusetts was to put distance between the two of them, to put temptation out of his reach. And though she always addressed her letters to me, I knew they were meant to let Edwin know how she was and where she was, and that she never forgot him.

 
"Did you know, Emily, that I brought Fannie here against your father's will?"

 
Emily's startled eyes lifted to her mother's as the older woman continued. "He was very angry when I told him she was coming. He shouted at me, one of the few times ever, and said, no, he absolutely wouldn't have Fannie here, which, of course, only confirmed my suspicions—that the memory of her had not dulled over the years, that he still cared deeply for her. But I had taken the choice out of his hands by withholding the news about Fannie's coming until she was already underway."

 
Josephine smiled at their linked hands, her own thin and transparent as bone china, Emily's strong and marked from hard work. "You think me a little fetched, perhaps, to throw them together like that?" Her whisper suddenly gained vehemence as she gripped Emily's hand hard. "Oh, Emily, look at Fannie, just look at her. She's as different from me as sea is from earth. She's vivacious and spirited, laughing and gay while I'm helplessly staid and Victorian. I've never been like Fannie, never been the things your father really needed. He should have had her all these years, yet he remained loyal to me and honored the vows we made. He should have had the warmth and affection and the demonstrativeness of a woman like her, but instead he settled for me. And now she's here, and unless I miss my guess you discovered them—what? Kissing? Embracing? Is that it?"

 
From Emily's downcast eyes Josephine knew she'd guessed right.

 
"Well, perhaps they've earned the right."

 
"How can you say that, Mother?" Tears glistened in Emily's eyes as she lifted her head. "He's still your husband!"

 
Josephine released Emily's hand and studied the ceiling again. "This is very hard for me to say." Moments passed before she went on. "I … I cannot say I ever relished the marriage act, and I cannot help but wonder if it wasn't because simple respect for your father wasn't quite enough for me either."

 
In eighteen years Emily had never heard her mother speak of anything remotely bordering on the carnal. Hearing it now made Emily—as well as Josephine—distinctly uncomfortable. Endless seconds ticked by while they struggled with their private embarrassment, then Josephine added, "I only wanted you to know it wasn't all your father's fault."

Their glances met, then strayed to impersonal objects in the room before Josephine found herself able to continue. "Another thing I want you to remember—in all the time Fannie has been here she has never distressed me, never once hinted that I'd done her a grave wrong by marrying the man she should have had. She has been the soul of benevolence—good, kind, and patient. And honorable to the teeth, I'm sure of it. She has made my dying days more bearable, Emily, just by being here."

 
The shock of hearing her mother predict her own death brought a denial from Emily. "Mother, you're not dying, don't say that!"

 
"Yes, I am, dear. And soon, I'm stronger today, but it won't last. And when I'm gone I want you prepared. Oh, you'll mourn me, but please, Emily, not for long. And, please, dear, you must give Edwin and Fannie the right to their happiness. If I can, surely you can. When he marries her, and I'm sure he will—he must!—you must be as benevolent to Fannie as she's been to me. And your father—well, surely you can imagine the anguish he's suffered, being married to the wrong woman all his life. Doesn't he deserve some happiness?"

 
"Oh, Mother…" Dropping to her knees, Emily fell across her mother's bed with tears streaming from her eyes. Josephine was not a woman often disposed to tears. Had she been, perhaps she could have made her husband happier. Dry-eyed, she studied the ceiling while touching the head of her weeping daughter.

 
"And what about you?" she inquired. "Are you ready to tell me about you and Charles … and this Mr. Jeffcoat?"

 
Startled, Emily's head shot up, her tearful eyes wide.

 
"You know?"

 
"Your father told me."

 
"He did?"

 
"Of course he did. What do you think we do up here in this room every evening? He tells me about his day, and you are a very important part of all his days."

 
Josephine's last disclosure had effectively stopped Emily's tears. Running a knuckle beneath each eye she said, "Papa was very upset when he found Tom and me kissing, wasn't he?"

 
"Yes. But now you should be able to understand why. He was—is—very concerned about you, just as I am. We love Charles very much. But I don't believe either one of us wants you to make the same mistake we did."

 
Crestfallen, Emily doubled forward and rested her cheek against the back of Josephine's hand. "Oh, Mother, what should I do?"

 
Josephine took her time answering, weighing her words. "I can't tell you, and I wouldn't presume to, not anymore. You're a very impulsive young woman, Emily. You close doors with the same vehemence with which you open them, just as you did to your father and Fannie. It's still closed—you see?" She turned to glance at the bedroom door. "The only advice I can give is to open the door—open all your doors. It's the only way you can see where you're going."

 
"Are you saying I shouldn't marry Charles?"

 
"Not at all. You seem to be the one who's questioning it."

 
Leaning across her mother's bed, Emily admitted it was true: she was questioning it, had been since her feelings for Tom had surfaced.

 
Tom.

 
Charles.

 
So great a decision to make in so little time.

 
Realizing the girl would have to make that decision for herself, Josie sent her on her way to do it. "And now I'm very tired, dear. I think I'd like to rest a while." She sighed and let her eyes close. "Please tell Fannie to wake me when your father comes home for dinner so I can eat with them."

Chapter 15

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T
iptoeing from her mother's room, Emily left the door open behind her. She stood in the hall staring at the wallpaper for several minutes. Fannie and Papa … since before he'd married Mother? How young had they been? Not much older than she was now. And Mother, resisting Papa's advances much as she, Emily, often resisted Charles's? The admission seemed too incredible to reconstruct. Yet Mother had intimated that carnal urgings should not be disregarded in making a decision about whom to marry.

 
Dazed, Emily navigated herself to her own room and dropped anchor on the foot of the bed. So many parallels, too many to ignore. She stared at the window ledge behind the lace curtains, imagining a love powerful enough to withstand more than twenty-two years, unrequited; a respect immense enough to withstand the same twenty-two years under a mantle of silent misgivings. How difficult for both Mother and Father. Yet they had persevered, given their children a foundation as secure as any religion or creed, for in all her life Emily had never suspected a rift in their devotion to one another.

 
And Fannie, the lorn one, how empty her life must have been. Beneath her veneer of gaiety, how much heartbreak must be hidden.

 
Charles would be like Fannie—lorn and empty and heartbroken—should Emily reverse her decision to marry him. But he would not remain cordial through the years as Fannie had with Mother and Father. He would be hurt and angry and would make it impossible for all three of them, herself and Tom and Charles, to live in a town this small without future bitterness.

 
The afternoon aged; blue shadows stained the snow-covered window ledge. Downstairs the oven door squeaked as Fannie opened and closed it. Emily checked the time: 4:30. In less than twenty-one hours she was scheduled to stand beside Mother's bed and join her life to Charles's. Irreversibly.

 
Could she do it?

 
More to the point, could she
not
do it?

 
She tried to imagine herself, when Charles came tonight, telling him, I've made a mistake, Charles, it's Tom I love, Tom I want to marry.

 
She crossed her arms and doubled forward, experiencing a real stab of pain. She had let them go on too long, her daunted feelings about Charles. How could she, at this eleventh hour, make such a decision?

 
Five o'clock came—full dark now, near winter solstice; five-thirty and Mother woke up across the hall; quarter to six and Papa came home, stamping his boots, washing his hands, asking where everybody was. Frankie banged in, fresh from sliding with Earl and the boys. The smell of roasting chicken drifted upstairs.

 
Emily rose and smoothed her skirt, moving about her dark bedroom, delaying the inevitable. She could not avoid them forever. In the hall a faint light drifted up from below. She stood at the top of the stairs gathering courage to take the first step. All the way downstairs she imagined facing Papa and Fannie to find them changed somehow, now that they had been redeemed by Mother's words. But when she entered the kitchen she found them looking the same as ever—Papa in his work clothes with underwear showing at the neck and wrists, reading the weekly newspaper, and Fannie in a long apron with her pale peach hair slightly ascatter, working at the stove. They looked much like any ordinary husband and wife, and Frankie—setting silverware on the table—might well have been their son. With a start, Emily realized it could have been true. Frankie might have been their son and she their daughter. The thought brought Emily a sharp feeling of inconstancy on Mother's behalf, yet Josephine was probably right: Fannie and Papa would someday be husband and wife.