Page 30 of Playing for Keeps in Starr's Fall
“Not that ridiculous,” Laurie protested, frowning. “I mean, Joshua is seven years older than me, and I don’t even think about it. Age is just a number.”
“Still…” Maggie protested. “It’s different when it’s the woman that’s older.”
“Now that’s just sexist,” Laurie replied, wagging her finger at Maggie. “There’s no reason why a woman can’t date a younger man. No reason at all.”
And be called a cougar?Maggie thought, shuddering inwardly at the thought. She really hoped the good people of Starr’s Fall weren’t saying such things about her. “Well, nothing is going on,” she replied firmly, “so the point is moot. And in any case, I’m not ready to date yet.”
Laurie’s laughing expression immediately dropped. “Of course not,” she murmured. “I understand. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have teased you.”
“No, no, it’s fine.” Talking about bereavement always felt like pouring cold water over a conversation, Maggie acknowledged with an inward sigh. “I mean, I might think about dating one day. It’s just there’s a lot to focus on right now.”
“Of course. Although…” Laurie was back to looking playful. “Sometimes you don’t choose to fall in love. It chooses you.”
Love!Now that was something she wasn’t remotely ready to think about, and yet maybe, she realized with a lurch, Zach was, with somebody.You don’t swipe right for the love of your lifesuggested as much, surely. Admittedly, he’d said it in such an offhand way, but Maggie had still sensed a deeper emotion beneath the words. But if Mr. Extra Spicy was looking for Miss Right… she surely could not be that woman. Not with her history, her emotional baggage, and yes, her age.
“I really don’t think that’s what’s going on,” she told Laurie, shaken by the nature of her own thoughts. “But I am very grateful for his help.” She glanced around the cute little store; Laurie had set it up like a living room, with a cozy armchair, bookshelves to house the merchandise, and a coffee maker bubbling away. “I was thinking about finally taking your advice and adopting a cat from the Humane Society,” she told Laurie. “I don’t think we can manage a dog, and Ben has always wanted a cat, anyway. I wanted to ask you about it.”
“Oh, wonderful! Cats are great pets. I’ve got some leaflets here, to take you through the process of adoption.”
“Great.” Adopting a cat was the next step in her and Ben’s resettlement project, in terms of making Starr’s Fall their home. Maggie wasn’t quite ready for the responsibility of a dog, with walks and so forth, but she liked the idea of a purring cat curling up in a windowsill of the café, and she thought she could manage to feed and change its litter box, at least. Ben had promised to help.
“So you must be starting to feel settled,” Laurie told her as she handed her the leaflet. “If you’re thinking of getting a cat.”
“We’re getting there, certainly.” She and Ben had been in Starr’s Fall a month already, and it had flown by. Maggie had continued attending Pilates—with the often liquid lunch afterward—and she’d come to know Annie, Zoe, Liz, and Elaine a lot better and felt she could call them friends. She’d even gone over to Annie’s for dinner and met her mother Barb, who was lovely but clearly declining in health as she struggled with the later stages of Parkinson’s.
It had been heartbreaking to witness, but Maggie was glad she’d been able to have a conversation with Annie, commiserating about elderly parents and offering her support. She’d also stopped into The Rolling Pin on several occasions both to discuss including their business at the café and just for bagels. She’d enjoyed getting to know Lizzy and Michael Harper and their two children. She’d half-hoped that their fourteen-year-old daughter Bella might be a friend for Ben as she seemed to be interested in boardgames, but Ben had been adamant that he wasn’t interested in having some kind of high school social life, and Maggie knew, after everything that had happened, she couldn’t force it. It would come, she hoped, in time, with healing.
And then there was Zach. Zach, Maggie acknowledged, had been a much bigger part of her life than was either comfortable or wise… and yet, she’d come to depend on him. The other day he hadn’t stopped by the café, and she’d felt down and out of sorts all afternoon, without realizing why until Ben had remarked upon his absence. He was easy company, often laughing and light, always willing to pitch in and do whatever was needed, whether it was schlepping boxes or talking RQ with Ben. He’d stayed for dinner more than once after that first pizza, when Ben had absolutely monopolized his time, which Maggie hadn’t minded because she and Zach had had enough deep conversation already that day.
Two weeks on, they still hadn’t talked about romance or lack thereof, which wasfine, because she really was enjoying them just being friends.And yet… Zach’sI like youhad opened up a Pandora’s box of unwieldy emotions and Maggie was struggling to put the lid back on it. Just as she’d told Laurie, she really wasn’t ready for romance.
But maybe, Maggie acknowledged, shewantedto be… even if dating someone like Zach still didn’t make sense, for all the same reasons she hadn’t been able to articulate to him when he’d asked. They were still there—her age, her emotional baggage, Zach’s history, Ben…
Way too much to think about. To deal with.
“It takes a while to feel settled,” Laurie remarked sagely, drawing Maggie out of her uncomfortable thoughts. “To tell you the truth, I lived in Trenton for six years and I never felt settled there.”
“That’s how I was in Greenwich,” Maggie replied, only semi-jokingly. “And I lived there fortwelveyears.” She grimaced, acknowledging the semi-waste of those years… and yet they’d been the majority of her adult life, as well as her marriage. How depressing was that, to think of them as a waste? And they hadn’t been, not entirely anyway…
“What didn’t you like about Greenwich?” Laurie asked.
Maggie frowned, unsure how to articulate the complicated tangle of her thoughts on that subject. Whathadn’tshe liked about her life? To outsiders, it had certainly seemed pretty charmed. Matt had thought it was, and with good reason, really—what had there been to complain about, after all? She’d had a big, beautiful house, a handsome, accomplished husband, a wonderful son, no worries about money, no need to work, a generous handful of supposedly like-minded friends…
And yet it was many of those so-called blessings that had made her start, guiltily, to resent her life behind the glowing, golden bars of what had felt, in time, like a gilded prison. And then there had been Matt… Matt, reveling in their new, blingy life, insisting she get on board in a thousand subtle and not-so-subtle ways that had made her feel farther from him than ever…
No. She didn’t want to think like that. She couldn’t let herself, because it opened the floodgates to too much guilt and regret. And she could hardly explain how her privileged life had felt like a prison to Laurie, whom she knew already from their conversations had had a difficult childhood in foster care and then the challenge of trying to make it on her own as an adult.
“It just felt empty,” she finally said, feeling wretched for admitting that much. “Kind of… soulless.” Which was a rather scathing indictment not just about her life, but her marriage. She looked away, wishing she hadn’t said so much, or even anything at all.
“It’s hard when life disappoints us,” Laurie said after a moment, her tone quiet and a little sad. She had a look on her face that made Maggie think she was thinking of something in particular, maybe even something recent, rather than the sorrows of her childhood.
“Has life disappointed you recently?” she asked, and then worried the question was far too intrusive. She hardly wanted Laurie asking it back! “Sorry, that’s not something I should ask,” she added hurriedly.
“No, it’s okay.” Laurie hesitated, her gaze on the jar of dog treats she’d been restocking. “Yes,” she finally answered. “Life has, actually. I… I moved to Starr’s Fall to look for my birth mom. I mean, I wanted to open this place, of course, but the reason I chose Starr’s Fall was because my biological mother put it on my birth certificate as where she was from. And I mean, I knew she’d probably moved on a long time ago, and I wasn’t going to bump her into the street or anything, but… I was hoping for someclues, at least, and…” She grimaced good-naturedly. “In the back of my mind, let’s be real, I was imagining some rose-tinted reunion, with hugs and tears and a selfie for social media.” She laughed, or tried to, before subsiding into silence.
“And that didn’t happen,” Maggie guessed quietly, her heart aching for Laurie.
“Well, yes and no,” Laurie admitted on a sigh. “I did find out who she was. And shedidend up contacting me after I’d messaged her online, which thrilled me at first… but it was only to demand I never attempt to contact her again. She even offered me money to stay away from her forever. Talk about serious.” Laurie tried for a smile, but Maggie could see from her pain-shadowed eyes and the tremble of her lips how much it still hurt. “So, to be honest, all that kind of sucked,” she finished flatly.
