Chapter 12
It wasn’t Margie’s intent, but Sunday dinner that week ended up just being her, Hank, Claire and Mike. It wasn’t her fault that all of the kids were busy and the four of them had to press on alone!
Sure, Margie was delighted that it worked out that way, but she hadn’tplannedit. No one could accuse her of scheming, or of not inviting the kids to dinner. She’d never do that. It just worked out this way, and it was great!
However, as she and Claire got dinner ready, she started to feel guilty. Claire seemed off. Anxious, even. Margie asked her if something was wrong, but she insisted that it was nothing.
They continued on in silence until Margie pulled the roast out of the oven and noticed Claire staring off into space. Perhaps Margie’s meddling, though unintentional this time, had gone too far.
“All right,” she said with her hands on her hips. “I can’t take it anymore. I’m sorry about this, but for once I didn’t do it on purpose.”
Claire snapped back into focus. “What? What do you mean?”
“Tonight’s dinner! Normally all of the kids come, or at least, some of them come. It’s rare that it’s just Hank and me. And Mike, now that he’s back to living on the island. I swear that I’m not trying to set you up again, but it just happened. I thought it was lucky, but now…”
“Oh!” Claire laughed. “I’m not upset about that.”
“I swear that I’ll stop being pushy. I mean, I’ll try.”
She waved a hand. “I know you can’t help it.”
Hm. That was true. But why was she being odd? Margie cleared her throat. “If it’s not that, then please tell me what it is. You’ve been so quiet. Are you worried about finding another job? I know how hard it can be, and – ”
“No, that’s not it. Not exactly.”
The timer for the potatoes went off, and Margie hurried to silence it. “Can you please just tell me?”
Claire bit her lip. “I don’t know if I should.”
Oh dear. There really was something wrong. “Is it the kids? Are they – ”
“No, it’s not them. They’re great.” She let out a sigh. “Okay. Fine. I can’t keep anything from you. How long do we have before dinner?”
“Twenty minutes. But I can send Hank and Mike away if you need more time.”
Claire shook her head and broke out a small smile. “No, it’s not that long of a story. It’s just a little wild.”
“Wild! I like wild!” Margie said brightly.
Claire took a seat at the kitchen island. “Do you remember anything about my brother-in-law’s family?”
Margie frowned. She knew Claire’s older sister Holly – well, she neverknewher, because the accident happened years before Margie and Claire met, but there were pictures all over Claire’s apartment of Holly and Rob. Claire had wanted the girls to remember their parents after she’d adopted the three of them.
“Not really,” Margie said after a moment. “Just that they live in Wisconsin.”
“Right,” Claire nodded. “And some of them still do. Robert, my brother-in-law, was an only child. His parents helped me as much as they could before they passed away, but you know, Robert’s dad had MS, and even when they moved out here, they had their own challenges. Robert’s uncle was always supportive, too. My brother-in-law was actually named after him.”
Margie’s mind was darting in every direction. She had no idea where this was going. “Okay…”
“Well anyway, long story short, he always tried to be involved in the kids’ lives. They lived so far away, you know, but we visited when we could, and he always offered to send money. He was never a wealthy man, and I felt strange accepting it, so I only did a few times to put it in the kids’ college fund. We always were able to get by, you know, one way or another.”
Margie nodded. Oh, she knew. She remembered what a struggle it was for Claire, especially when the girls were young. She was essentially a single mother, though she had a few people who helped. Her parents had died in the same accident as Holly and Rob.
It was awful. Rob had been a pilot – he flew commercially, mostly, but they’d gone up in a little plane that belonged to a friend. It was poorly maintained, unbeknownst to Robert, and had mechanical issues. They crashed in the mountains, and in a single moment, Claire lost her parents, her brother-in-law, and both of her sisters. Her twin sister Rebecca had been on board, too.
And in the chaotic aftermath, Claire adopted Holly’s three young daughters. When she first told Margie about it, all those years ago, she was able to speak candidly, though she understandably got emotional. Yet, considering the circumstances, she was still rather stoic about the situation.
Even now, she didn’t have any phobias about going up in the plane with Mike. Margie was impressed with Claire, for many reasons, but she couldn’t pretend to understand her.
