25
GRACE, READJUSTING
“This is going to take a while.”
Crawford’s straight-up, matter-of-fact
observation was obviously not intended to have the demoralizing
effect on Grace that it did.
Not that it took Crawford to tell her
that she was going to be tied up in this current project for . . .
well, maybe forever. All she had to do was look around her. The
bedroom that had once been Steven’s now served as command central
for Rigoletto’s on-line. Grace’s computer sat on Steven’s old
student desk, next to a three-drawer file cabinet containing the
store’s paper records going back to 2006, which she still needed to
sort through.
In Portland, over Christmas, she had
been too distraught to do much more than toss everything in boxes
and load it onto the U-Haul. Now she was paying for her
disorganization. New and used CDs lay everywhere, piling up on
tabletops and windowsills. And these were just from the boxes she
had opened. The unopened ones were stacked in the closet alongside
Steven’s abandoned early eighties wardrobe items. Milk crates
dotted the floor, filled with LPs and even some 78s that in moments
of madness she had accepted as trades.
Also scattered about the room was her
push puppet collection. She’d opened that box by mistake and then
had been unable to resist taking them all out and showing Crawford,
who’d seemed underwhelmed. Dominic had been more impressed by the
old-fashioned toys. Grace owned about forty of them, most given to
her by her dad when she was little, or more recently sent to her by
Sam on his travels.
She absently fiddled with one now—a
milkmaid her father had sent her when she was a girl, from a trip
to Switzerland. Push the plunger under the pedestal that the little
segmented figure stood on and she collapsed in a heap. Release it,
she popped back up again. The action seemed to soothe her, like
those Chinese worry balls some people used. There was so much work
ahead. She wished she could make herself rebound as quickly as a
push puppet.
Transferring the inventory of
Rigoletto’s to its new on-line home was taking longer than she’d
thought it would. And that was even with many of the used CDs going
into batches for immediate eBay auction. Crawford was tackling that
task now—sorting through several hundred used CDs and making sure
the batches of twenty-five to be auctioned didn’t have duplicates.
Meanwhile Grace cataloged, photographed, and priced the better
selections.
“I should have done this years ago,”
she said, putting the milkmaid aside.
“Why didn’t you?” Crawford
asked.
“Because I had my store. It kept me
busy enough.”
“Why don’t you open a store
here?”
She shook her head. She didn’t have
time now for a brick-and-mortar store. She could take care of her
on-line business from home and keep an eye on her dad at the same
time.
So maybe everything had all turned out
for the best.
Sure. Time to write
Ben a thank-you note.
“Grace?”
She turned abruptly.
“You know how you told me to tell you
if you started to space out?” Crawford asked.
“Yeah.”
“You’re spacing out.”
She laughed. “Thanks.”
Lou came down the hall and poked his
head in. “You’re not putting any of my records on the Internet, are
you?”
This was a running concern with him. He
eyed the records with suspicion.
“No, Dad. This is all Rigoletto’s
stock.”
He shook his head. “You shouldn’t have
done it.”
“What?”
“Gotten rid of your
store.”
“I haven’t, Dad. I’ll still have
it—it’s just in cyberspace now.”
“It’s not the same, though, is
it?”
“It’s better,” she said. “I don’t have
to pay rent on a building.”
She kept her voice cheerful, but it was
a lie. Even if sometimes she had felt like a slave to it, she had
loved going to the store every day. When she went back to Portland
in December, staying at her Mom’s while she cleared out the duplex,
closed up shop, and packed all her inventory away, it had been hard
sometimes to get work done at the store for all the knocking on the
door. Old customers came by to lament the closing, and several of
her musician friends who had played at Rigoletto’s talked her into
having one last big New Year’s bash. When Sasha, her friend who was
a cellist with the Oregon Symphony, had started playing “Auld Lang
Syne,” she’d feared she just might lose it.
What am I
doing? she’d wondered. Suddenly it had all felt like a
mistake, as if she’d fishtailed on the highway and discovered
herself going in the wrong direction. And her doubts were
compounded by the subtle yet constant echo of doom her mother kept
up as she was staying at her house.
“I hope you’re not making a mistake,”
she’d kept repeating, with the underlying meaning that there was
very little doubt that Grace was making a
grave error. “It’s selfish of Lou and the boys to pressure you to
move down there.”
“The boys are
both in their thirties, and no one’s pressured me to do
anything.”
“Well of course they wouldn’t come
right out and say it . . . But look what you’ve already given
up—your store, and Ben.”
“I didn’t give up Ben. He
left.”
“But if you had been here . .
.”
The very idea had made Grace huff in
frustration. “You didn’t even like Ben!” she reminded her mom. “But
now when he’s gone, you act like losing him is the tragedy of my
life.”
“I just don’t want you to end up
alone.”
“I won’t.” She smiled. “I’ll have
Dad.”
Her mother had looked on her pityingly
and shook her head.
Her stepfather had no opinion about her
moving, and Natalie and Jake reacted to the news as if it wasn’t
that big a deal anyway. And it probably wasn’t, to them. They were
both so wrapped up in their teenage lives, her problems could only
seem dull and remote. Strange, Grace thought, that she missed
Dominic and Lily over Christmas more than she’d ever missed her own
stepbrother and stepsister in Oregon.
Someone was at the front door. When Lou
left the room to get it, Crawford asked, “It’s on account of him
that you came back, isn’t it?”
She opened her mouth to deny it but
admitted, “Mostly.”
“I wouldn’t move across the country to
take care of my dad,” he grumbled.
“Maybe in twenty or thirty years things
will look different.”
“Or maybe Dad’ll still be married and I
won’t have to worry about it.”
“Still
married?” Had Wyatt gotten married while no one was
looking?
“Dad’s engaged,” Crawford said. “To
Pippa.”
“Who?”
“Pippa—his girlfriend.” He scowled and
added, “One of his girlfriends. He said he thought we needed
stability. I think he just means he wants somebody in the house to
stay with me while he’s away. But I’m sixteen.”
“I’m amazed.”
“Amazed by what?” Lily asked from the
doorway. She leaned against the frame, hugging her book to her
chest. Grace recognized it as her journal—the Lily West equivalent
of Linus’s blue blanket.
Grace didn’t feel at liberty to discuss
Wyatt’s impending marriage with the neighbors, since she’d just
heard about it herself, so there was a short, awkward pause before
Crawford told Lily the news. “Dad’s engaged to Pippa.”
“I thought he liked the other one
better,” Lily said.
“I think he did, but turned out she had
a husband.”
So it was Pippa by default,
evidently.
“Wow.” Lily sat in the folding chair
next to the desk and looked at Grace. “Can I borrow a
pen?”
Grace obligingly slid a ballpoint
across the desktop. “You’re going to have that book filled up
before long.”
“I know.” Lily lamented, nibbling her
lip as she started making notes.
“I’m surprised you don’t blog,” Grace
said, “or use Twitter.”
Lily gaped at her for a moment. “I’m
not an exhibitionist! I’m writing private
thoughts. That way, if I ever decide to become a writer, I’ll have
lots of material. I mean, it’ll all be here, right?”
“That might depend on what kind of book
you’ll want to write.”
“Coming-of-age books are perennially popular,” Lily said. “And I’m coming of age
right now, so it’s important to get it all down, and experience
everything.” She paused to write for a moment before adding
casually, “Like the spring dance, for instance.”
Crawford didn’t pick up on her cue, so
she continued, “Last year I didn’t want to go, but I really need to
go to the spring dance this year to see what it’s like. Maybe I
should be helping you all out so I could splurge on a new
dress.”
At last she’d caught Crawford’s
attention. “A dress!” he exclaimed in disgust. “Why would you waste
your money on that? Money should be saved for important
things.”
Lily sat up straighter. Grace, too. It
wasn’t often Crawford got riled up.
“Important things like cars?” Lily
guessed, a hint of disdain creeping into her voice despite what was
probably a mighty effort to keep it out.
“Well . . . yeah,” he said. “Anyhow,
you could get a dress for next to nothing at
Goodwill.”
Lily tapped the pen on the desk,
evidently visualizing herself at the big dance in a thrift store
prom dress. “That sounds a little Jordany.”
There was a pause before Crawford
ventured to ask, “I guess Jordan always has plenty of dates to the
dance?”
“She hates dances!” Lily said. “Who’d
want to take her anyway?”
Grace was torn between wanting to get
involved in their conversation and an even sharper desire to shut
it out. Being a teenager had been stressful. Watching other people
going through it felt a little like rubbernecking at a traffic
accident.
She concentrated on inputting an
out-of-print Beethoven CD of violin concertos that she’d had for a
while. The Internet was actually the best place to sell something
like this, since random customers browsing in a store wouldn’t know
why a certain recording, and a used one at that, could cost twice
as much as most other CDs. It took a specific buyer.
Lou came back in, an album tucked under
his arm. “I thought I’d give you this one to sell.”
It was an old CBS edition of
Pictures at an Exhibition. Very common.
“You should hold on to that,” she said, continuing typing. “It’s
not worth anything.”
Too late, she realized her words had
lacked tact.
“It’s a great record!” he said, nearly
shouting.
The two kids stopped their discussion
of the spring dance to look up at them.
“It is a great
recording, but it’s Leonard Bernstein, Dad. It’s been reissued a
bijillion times. That’s why it’s not worth anything.”
Her words did little to smooth his
ruffled feathers. “It’s worth something to me.”
“All the more reason you should keep it
for yourself,” she said.
He glowered at the piles of records and
CDs and stalked away.
“That wasn’t very nice,” Lily said to
Grace. “Why would you tell him his record was
worthless?”
“Because it is. Just because
something’s good doesn’t mean it’s worth a lot.”
Lily pursed her lips. “That’s a
mercenary viewpoint.”
Crawford snorted.
“What?” Lily asked.
“She’s running a business here. Money’s
the whole point, idiot.”
Lily sprang to her feet. “I’m not an
idiot! I just don’t happen to believe scraping money together is
the most important thing in the whole world!”
“Well, what is, then?” Crawford
asked.
Her face was mottled red. “Learning—and
being smart enough to know not to insult people. Especially people
who . . .”
“Who what?” Crawford
asked.
“Oh, never mind!” Lily wheeled on the
balls of her feet and stormed out the door.
“Lily!” Crawford called after her. He
glanced over to Grace and rolled his eyes. “Am I supposed to run
after her and apologize?”
“Only if you want to make
peace.”
He released a long-suffering sigh.
“What was she doing over here anyway?”
“Can’t imagine,” Grace
replied.
“She’s always over here and she never
does anything.”
“Maybe she enjoys our
company.”
His expression darkened and he turned
back to his pile of CDs. “Is a prelude different than an
impromptu?” He held up two Chopins for her to inspect.
“No, those can go in the same batch,”
she told him.
He nodded and seemed absorbed in the
task, but a few minutes later he blew out a breath. “I guess I
should go over and apologize, but it seems
a little stupid, doesn’t it? I mean, she’s obviously not an idiot.
She’d have to be a moron to think I really meant it.”
“Before you apologize, you might want
to consider your wording.”
He stood up. “I’ve got the five piles
here worked out, anyhow. That’s two hours. Do you need me anymore
today?”
“No, but if you have time tomorrow . .
.”
“I’ll be here after school,” he
promised.
He was turning to leave when he walked
smack into Jordan. She was panting, and he reached out as if to
hold her up by her arms. “What’s the matter?”
She hopped backward to avoid his
touching her. “Do you have a car?”
The question sent a tremor of
frustration through him. “No!”
“Shit!” Jordan looked at Grace, her
eyes pleading. “Can you help me? Please? My
friend is having an emergency! She’s really sick. I think she needs
to go to the hospital.”
“Shouldn’t you call an ambulance?”
Grace asked.
“She says she can’t afford an
ambulance!” Jordan snapped. “I’m really worried about her. If I had
the money for a cab, I’d get one and pick her up, but I
don’t.”
“I have money!” Crawford
said.
Jordan’s eyes lit up.
“Really?”
Before Crawford could offer up all his
hard-earned savings, the savings he had just been telling Lily he
was loathe to part with for anything other than a car, Grace
intervened. “I’ll take you,” she said, grabbing her purse off the
desk. “It will be faster than a cab.”
Jordan blinked at her.
“Seriously?”
“Sure, come on.”
Jordan turned, swinging her snaggle of
recently dyed peach-and-black striped hair over her
shoulder.
“Hey!” Crawford said. “You want me to
go with you?”
“No, that’s probably not necessary,”
Grace told him. Then she remembered her dad. “But if you could
stick around here for a little bit . . . ?”
“C’mon!” Jordan cried as she clattered
down the stairs. “This is life and death!”
Crawford’s disappointment was palpable,
but he shrugged and answered, “Sure. I didn’t have anything else to
do.” Then he called out, “I hope your friend’s okay,
Jordan!”
Jordan was already out the front
door.
Poor Lily,
Grace thought. She’ll never get that apology
now.