Page 56 of Look on the Bright Side

An hour later, she was sitting in the gallery office, door once again closed. Meeko clearly knew something was up, because he brought her a chai latte from Blue Willow—“On me, Boss”—an unprecedented event. She should get furious more often.

She wasn’t working. She was thinking.

She didn’t want a different life. She didn’t want a different man, or a divorce, or anything, really. But this wasn’t nothing. This wasn’t a blip. This had been more than three months of her husband engaging with another woman. Flirting, complimenting…talking about her, the grim workaholic artist, self-consumed. Every time he’d read or written a message, he’d been cheating on her.

If anyone had the right to complain about her, Ellie thought, it was her children. She and Gerald had bucked convention in having a big family. But they’d never been those parents who thought each kid was a superstar waiting to happen, or a fragile little hothouse flower who needed to be protected and explained and have special dispensations. They were kids. Let them bicker, make mistakes, get a mediocre grade (though Harlow and Lark never had). Let them figure it out. Free-range kids who could entertain themselves, do their own homework and help around the house while their parents were…well, the adults. Not the kids’ friends, not only Mommy and Daddy, but people and, most importantly, a couple.

After all, they had always known there’d come a day when the kids would leave and they’d be together, alone, for the rest of their lives. They wanted that day to come. That was the goal—raise the kids, not keep them like pets for their own entertainment, or have them stuck in perpetual adolescence, playing video games in the cellar, forever unemployed.

Gerald? Gerald had no right to complain about her. Or their marriage. It was ridiculous.

He’d said something that had flashed in her brain…and faded. Thanks, menopause. What had it been? She’d been too angry to hear it clearly, her own brain shouting the entire time. Right. The…interactions…had begun after Lark moved out, the last child to leave. He’d said he was bored, but seriously? He’d yearned to retire. But what was that other thing he’d said? Her angry, fizzing brain couldn’t grab on to it. She should’ve recorded the whole conversation.

Ellie thought of the divorced couples she knew. That pretentious idiot Brad Fairchild had cheated on Lillie Silva, and Brad had married someone else within the year (and ended up divorced from her, too). Grace suspected that Larry had cheated on her, but she was of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” school. Would she feel a sense of triumph to learn it wasn’t all sunshine and daisies for her and Gerald?

Enough ruminating. Time to paint. Ellie went to the stuffy little studio upstairs, where Cranberry Bog in Autumn #3 sat waiting. It was very pretty so far and would probably sell at a good price. Her plan had been to hang the bog paintings in August, when the summer people would be awash in melancholy about having to go home and would want to feel some fall, Capey vibes. Fishermen and cranberry farmers were popular subjects.

Instead of working on that now, though, she took out a fresh canvas—she stretched her own linen and always had a few primed and ready—and set it on the easel. Looked at her paints and chose a few colors for the palette. Navy, black, vermillion and gray. Then she attacked that poor, innocent canvas with slashes of color. She wasn’t going for anything in particular, not a house, not a landscape, not a person. Just paint on canvas, applied with palette knife and stiff brushes, with her fingers, with steel wool. As she worked, she thought it resembled a murder scene more than anything, and you know what? That was okay with her. She painted until six thirty, cleaned up and then headed for home.

The message had gone out, apparently. Her children’s various vehicles took up what room there was in the driveway. The lawn mower was still there, cutting off two spaces with its innards strewn about. It seemed symbolic that there wasn’t any room for her here. Then again, she was mighty touchy today.

“Hi, Mom!” came a chorus, and her hardened heart softened as her kids greeted her with hugs and smiles. Imogen, who looked so much like Addie and Lark, held up her arms, and Ellie obliged, scooping up the little girl for a nuzzle. “How’s my sweetie pie?” she asked.

“Gran, Gran, look at me! Do you like my dress?” Esme asked, twirling.

“I love it, honey. Such a pretty color. Did you know, purple’s my favorite?” She bent and kissed Esme’s head.

“Ah, the beautiful Elsbeth,” said Robert. “How are you, my dear?”

“Fine, Robert, just fine,” she lied.

“You’re taking good care of yourself, I hope?” Those faded blue eyes saw a lot.

She looked away. “I’m trying, Robert. How are you?”

She didn’t talk to Gerald until he served dinner. He’d gone all out—spaghetti with clams and garlic, fresh parsley, a green salad. There was even a cake sitting on the counter. Kissing up to the kids, she thought. Reminding them how great dear old Dad was.

“Hi, everyone, sorry I’m late,” Lark said, coming through the door. “Just in time, though, I see.” She dropped a kiss on Addie’s head, smooched each girl and sat down. “I’m starving, Dad. This smells like heaven.”

“How’s the fake boyfriend?” Robbie asked, and Ellie sat and listened as her children joked and talked, teasing each other, referencing things that went over her own head. Nicole buttered bread for the little girls, who were picky eaters, and Grandpop held forth, telling them about a walk he and Frances had taken, in which they’d come upon a lemonade stand. He’d given the two five-year-olds all the money in his wallet. “The best eighty-seven dollars I’ve ever spent!” he said. “I think it made a very good impression on Frances.”

“Or she thinks you’re senile, Grandpop,” Winnie said. “That’s a lot for lemonade.”

“She did offer to count the money out for me, now that you mention it,” Grandpop said. “But I wanted to help the little girls. They were very adorable. Not quite as adorable as you two, though!”

“I very adorable,” Imogen said.

“You gonna marry Frances, Grandpop?” Robbie asked.

“She says we have to date for two years first,” he answered. “By which time, I may well be dead and buried! I suppose we have to trust the universe. That’s what she says, anyway.”

“Okay,” Gerald said suddenly, his voice loud. Ellie knew his father’s dotty wisdom and rambling stories could irritate him. “So, kids, Dad…um, Ellie, did you want to say anything?”

“I’ll be living with Joy Deveaux for a while,” Ellie said, twirling some pasta. She kept her tone light.

“Oh, my God, that house,” Harlow said. “Can I come, too?”

“Why?” asked Winnie.

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