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It’ll be hard, she thought. Because her mom didn’t seem to want to work on the relationship in the same way. But that didn’t mean Robin should give up.
So she wouldn’t. She’d find a way to move past her bitter feelings, and then she’d try again. That was all anyone could do, right?
She once again saw Clara as an example. The woman’s husband had been involved in a terrible extortion scheme. They’d lost everything. She’d returned to the cove, a place Robin knew she’d once hated.
Clara had never left Scott’s side. Things might have been strained between them for a while, but she hadn’t given up. She’d stayed. She’d worked on the challenges between them, and Robin couldn’t even begin to fathom what they’d been.
She didn’t know what lay ahead for her and her mother either. She’d find out, because she wasn’t going to abandon the path she and her mother had started on forty-six years ago.
“We’re here,”Eloise said as she bustled into Alice’s kitchen. Behind her, Aaron carried an extremely hot casserole dish of bacon-wrapped water chestnuts. The glaze on which wouldn’t be good for another thirty minutes.
She couldn’t dwell on it. Being here was better than having the perfect appetizer. No matter what she did, hers wouldn’t be the best anyway, and she’d never spent much time caring if her dish got praised the most.
“You made it,” her mother said, and Eloise stepped into her and gave her a kiss. She noted the cat hair on her mother’s sweater, and a pang of nostalgia for a simpler time hit Eloise unexpectedly.
At the same time, she wouldn’t trade her current life, not for one with her and her two cats and any students she’d managed to scrounge up sharing a small Thanksgiving meal out of her Boston brownstone.
Now, she had an amazing, doting, caring, loving husband. She was the mother to two amazing girls. The dog they had could challenge the most patient person on the planet, and she said, “Prince couldn’t resist the bacon this morning.”
Her mother laughed, and Eloise rolled her eyes. “I had to start over on the water chestnuts, and they haven’t had time to sit.”
“Don’t worry.” Her mom swept her hand toward the house, where people stood in groups, laughing and talking. Some sat at one of the tables Alice had set up. Some lounged on the furniture in the living room. “You’re not even the last one to arrive.”
“No?” Eloise scanned the area. Alice and Arthur stood with Duke and Robin. Their kids sat in the living room, laughing at something on Ginny’s phone. Billie and Grace had gone that way, and not far from them, Lena stood with Jean, Kristen, Theo, and Scott.
She didn’t see Clara, but then the woman came down the hall from the front door with Kelli and Parker on her heels. AJ sat at the dining room table with Matt and Asher, the little boy already strapped into a high chair there.
“Who’s not here yet?”
“Reuben had to reprogram the fog signal,” her mom said. “Alice’s father and step-mother missed the ferry from Rocky Ridge. She said we wouldn’t have to wait for them, but Robin said it wasn’t a problem.”
Eloise and Aaron weren’t serving their Thanksgiving dinner until closer to evening, and it wasn’t noon yet.
Aaron had dressed and bagged the bird, sliding the hen into the oven only a few moments after Eloise had taken out the second batch of water chestnuts.
“Laurel and Paul said James had a bad night, and they’re running late,” Eloise’s mother said. “So they’re not here yet either.”
Eloise nodded, feeling some measure of relief that she and her family weren’t the last ones to arrive. It wouldn’t matter if they were, as Eloise wouldn’t think anything of whoever arrived last.
Alice caught sight of her and came over. “El.” She hugged her, her powdery, rosy perfume striking Eloise as so Alice. She wore a dark brown pair of wide-leg pants that flowed easily with her lithe frame, and Eloise looked down at them.
“I’m never wearing jeans again,” she said. “Don’t you love the wide-leg pant?” She grinned at Alice, who agreed that she loved them. Her blouse bore autumn leaves that had clearly just been gusted by some invisible wind, and two or three of them matched the brown in Alice’s pants perfectly.
“Aaron.” She moved over to him and hugged him. He told her about the water chestnut mishap, and Alice simply laughed.
“I think there’s enough food. Plus, we’re not starting for a few more minutes anyway.”
The Thanksgiving Appetizer Hour idea had been a big winner with everyone on the group text, Eloise included.
She’d been able to get Billie and Grace up and looking presentable with the promise of delicious foods and fun, older friends, and she looked over to the girls in the living room.
Billie had braided her own hair back on the sides, and then she’d done Grace’s. They both perched on armrests, Billie looking over Mandie’s shoulder while Grace pointed at something on Lena’s tablet.
Aaron slid his arm around her waist and leaned into her. “So no stress.”
“Yeah, sorry,” she said. Sometimes, she still couldn’t believe how different her life was with him in it. She couldn’t believe he was in her life, and that he continued to want to be there.
“Stress isn’t good for baby-making,” he murmured, and then he moved away from her as Arthur said his name.
