Looking for Jane (81)
It’s a winter wedding, and she wonders whether her mother’s wedding cape might serve to hide some of the ostentatiousness of the style, or if the addition of yet another layer of fabric might further overwhelm it. But at the thought of the wedding cape, she recalls her grandmama’s words that day at the nursing home.
That was right around the time they got you.
Nancy’s finding it hard to breathe through the cinched corset of the dress, and her calves are starting to protest in the expensive mile-high heels the saleswoman shoved onto her feet before parading her out of the changing room and up onto the dais. With difficulty, she hikes up the layers of fabric, piling it in her arms. She kicks off the shoes and digs her toes gratefully into the scratchy carpet before flopping down, none too gracefully, onto her bum. The dress pools around her and she wonders how long her mother will be with the saleswoman.
A set of bells tinkles over the shop door and Nancy watches in the mirror as a mother and daughter enter. Sounds from the street rush in with them, and Nancy aches to get the hell out of this dress and go home. She watches for a while as they paw through the racks of dresses, blond heads together, smiling and critiquing the styles in low voices. The women look up from the racks. But for the lines in the older woman’s face, they could be sisters.
Nancy’s mind wanders to Margaret Roberts. Ever since she saw the ad, she can’t stop thinking about her. Now she wonders what kind of taste she had. In some alternate reality, would they have sorted through the racks together in this same bridal store?
“Good Lord, Nancy!” Nancy’s eyes snap from the mother-daughter pair over to Frances, who has emerged from the back room, cheeks flushed with embarrassment. “Get up off the floor! What are you doing?”
“I’m sorry!” Nancy says, scrambling to her feet as best she can and nearly tripping over the fabric as she descends the stairs from the dais in her bare feet. “I could hardly breathe in it, I needed to sit down.” She lets the dress fall again and it swishes out to the sides and back.
“You are not supposed to sit down in a gown such as this,” the saleswoman tells her. She’s carrying a burgundy taffeta mother-of-the-bride ensemble. “The dress should wear you, not vice versa.”
“Am I supposed to eat my dinner standing up, then?”
“Well, what do you think?” Frances interjects. “Is this the one?”
“It’s beautiful!” the blond girl calls from the racks.
“You should do it!” her mother adds.
“See?” Frances says, and Nancy spots a smug smirk on the saleswoman’s face as she relieves Frances of the taffeta dress and clip-clops over to the cash desk.
Nancy looks at her mother. Her eyes are sparkling with love—for both her daughter and the designer dress—and Nancy feels the futility of the situation settle on her puffed-up shoulders. She pastes a smile on her face.
Frances turns to the saleswoman. “We’ll take it.”
CHAPTER 22 Angela
MARCH 2017
Three days after Angela requested that Tina put her in touch with Dr. Evelyn Taylor, Angela finds herself standing outside the doctor’s apartment door with a box of bakery brownies in hand.
After Angela explained her theory about “Maggie” to her initially skeptical, then increasingly intrigued wife, Tina emailed Dr. Taylor to ask if she might be willing to speak to Angela about her experience at the maternity home. Angela feels a squirm of guilt that they didn’t warn Dr. Taylor about precisely why Angela was so eager to meet with her. Tina just told her Angela had been reading The Jane Network and was keen to talk about it. Which is true, but if there’s the slightest chance Dr. Taylor was best friends with Margaret Roberts, Nancy’s birth mother, she might know something Angela doesn’t. It’s worth a conversation and some overpriced brownies to find out.
Dr. Taylor’s apartment is only a few blocks away from Thompson’s Antiques at the end of a quiet side street that will be gloriously full of lush leaves and flowering trees in a few weeks. Angela knocks on the street-level door, and a minute later hears steps on the stairwell. The door opens, and Dr. Evelyn Taylor appears. She’s tall and wearing jeans and a black sweater over a striped collared shirt.
“You must be Angela,” she says, extending her hand.
Angela shifts the box of brownies and grasps the doctor’s hand. “Hi! Thank you so much for taking the time to meet with me, Dr. Taylor.”
“Evelyn, please. And it’s my pleasure. I’m a big fan of your wife, plus you brought baked goods, so we’re going to get on just fine. Come on in.”
She steps sideways and Angela crosses the threshold, climbs the creaky stairs to the second floor.
“Head straight on in,” Evelyn says from behind her.
Angela turns the knob and enters the apartment, which she instantly falls in love with. The trim around the doors, windows, and baseboard is all in the old craftsman style, painted matte white. Old-fashioned, but considered chic now that it’s back in vogue. The ceiling is surprisingly high for a second-floor apartment, the plaster design a repeating swirl pattern reminiscent of ocean waves. The walls are painted a pale sage green, fresh and relaxing. The windows facing out onto the street run nearly floor to ceiling, allowing the soft winter light to filter in between the floaty, sheer curtains.