All I Ever Wanted(115)

“Uh… He’s actually going out of town for a couple days, Callie. Maybe you could call him at home?” And leave me alone?

“Okay. Sorry, Carmella. Didn’t mean to bother you.”

“No bother, sweetie.”

Great. She was being nice. Ian must really hate me. Or maybe not. Maybe he just got sick of me. He was a man who was trying to make order out of the chaos of his life, and I was a messy addition, after all, with my crying and blubbering and lateness and slutty shoes and a sister who announced middle-aged impregnations all over town and a brother who attracted drug-sniffing dogs. Ian was…well, he was probably looking for something else.

It was pretty clear he wasn’t looking for me…not when I was just sitting here, waiting to be found.

Rreehhhrruuhrrooo! Bowie nudged my hand with his nose.

“I love you, too, Bowie,” I said, then wiped my eyes and took a look in my closet to see what I’d need to purge.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

THE DAY BEFORE MY parents once again pledged themselves to each other was my last day at Noah’s.

I’d already moved most of my stuff to my tiny house. My big old leather couch, my many houseplants and pictures of my nieces, my shoe collection. I bought café curtains for the kitchen in a green fern print, scavenged a couple of things from my parents…an end table and lamp from Dad, an old brass tub from Mom that looked really sweet outside the front door.

Next week, I’d start at the Senior Center. As Jody predicted, I was offered the job almost immediately. Who knew one feeble hip-hop class would generate so much goodwill? It paid less than I made at Green Mountain Media, but that was okay. Something Ian’s aunt had said had stuck in my brain…my job in advertising had been to make people buy more crap. And let’s be honest; most people didn’t really need more crap.

The Senior Center, on the other hand, gave the older people in Georgebury somewhere to go, something to do. It fostered community and usefulness. The idea of working there just felt better. Cleaner. More karmic or something. Maybe all those yoga classes hadn’t been for naught, after all. I already had great plans. Adopt a Brownie Troop. Memoir classes. Field trips and blood drives. More hip-hop, and this time, by someone who knew what she was doing.

So it was all good. We Greys were better than we’d been in a long, long time. After all these years, my father had gone from bad dog to good man. And Mom…no longer was she the bitter betrayed. Instead, she had done that most difficult and generous thing a person could do…she forgave the man who’d hurt her. Forgave him so deeply and truly that she could even love him again. Tomorrow would be beautiful indeed.

But for now, I had to leave Noah’s and go to my new home. Freddie had thoughtfully made himself absent, and Bowie and I sat for a minute in my nearly empty bedroom, the afternoon sun streaming in through the windows, belying the chill in the air.

It seemed like I’d been here a lot longer than two and a half years. The day I’d moved in here, Noah had yelled at me. “I don’t need a f**kin’ nursemaid, and don’t you forget it, young lady!” He was still in a wheelchair back then, and he slammed it into the doorframe three times before he made it into the workshop, where he sequestered himself for the rest of the day. That night, I found a little whittled chickadee on my bureau as an apology. That bird now sat on the windowsill of my cottage’s kitchen.

The only thing left to bring over was my chair, as I hadn’t wanted it to be scraped or jostled with my other belongings.

I stood up, let Bowie out and then approached my prized possession. Taking it gently by the arms, I carried it downstairs, being sure not to let it bump against the railings. Out the front door, into the back of Hester’s minivan, which she’d lent me for just this purpose.

Funny how it felt to be driving out of town, past the little shops and buildings of downtown, past the railroad station and mill. Past Green Mountain Media, past Toasted & Roasted, past Elements. I wasn’t leaving Georgebury, but I was leaving a lot behind.

When I arrived at the cottage, I let Bowie out, sucked in a few breaths of the cold, piney air, then got the chair. With great reverence, I carried it to the porch and set it down. My own home. This was what my chair and I had been waiting for. I smiled in anticipation and looked at the chair.

Huh. It wasn’t… It didn’t look quite right. I moved the chair to the left a few inches. No. How about here, to just right of the window? Not there, either. I tried angling it, first west, then east. Put it in the far corner, then moved it over near the door.

Something was off. After all this time, the chair was too…much. Too beautiful, too full of grace.

The thought came to me so fast and hard that almost before it was fully formulated, I had loaded the chair back in Hester’s car. Fifteen minutes later, I turned off Bitter Creek Road.

In the late afternoon sunlight, Ian’s house was even lovelier…and lonely, somehow. No car was in the driveway, no dog barked from within. Maybe Ian was still at work…maybe he was truly out of town, as Carmella had said. Heck, maybe he was in Russia, buying a wife. I just didn’t know.

I popped the hatch and took out the chair once more. When I set it on the porch, I knew it had found its home. The happily-ever-after chair belonged here, whether or not Ian and I were together.

I went back to the car, rummaged in the glove box and found a pen and a napkin, which would have to do. I sat for a moment, thinking of all the clever things I’d written over the years. Nothing clever came to me now, nothing perfect or transformative. After a minute, I gave up and just wrote what I meant.