Justine’s visit and her ominous predictions created a pretty dark day for Adele. Her head ached from her brow being furrowed all day. She hadn’t even begun to figure out what she wanted to do next before Justine threw a wrench into everything. Addie was lost in deep thought; she took a couple of hours with a calculator, looking over the numbers. They were pretty bleak. It had been a consideration to get a home equity loan to improve the property before selling it, but if Justine couldn’t swing it, how was Addie supposed to? She was pretty sure one had to have a job before being approved for a loan.
Addie had no money, no income, just what Justine provided. There was a little saved from the insurance, but without money from Justine, she was going to run out soon. How could her sister do this to her now? While Addie cared for their mother, Justine and her family had been to France and Italy and Scotland, not to mention many long weekend trips here and there. They had all the sports equipment under the sun and lived in a very nice house. And now, after Adele had put in eight years, Justine was warning her that she might pull the rug out from under her? How could she?
She tried to remember that Justine hadn’t had it as easy as it all looked. Law school was a struggle for her, though in the end she graduated with honors. Then she worked long hours while Scott started to work shorter and shorter weeks. When Justine wanted a baby and didn’t conceive, she saw infertility specialists and was thirty-five before being blessed with the birth of her daughter Amber. Then, like so many infertile women, she ignored birth control after Amber was born, thinking she just couldn’t get pregnant. Olivia came eleven months after Amber.
Adele couldn’t really remember all the details of Justine and Scott’s early years together, but by the time her nieces were born when she was in high school, it was obvious that Scott made sure the girls got what they needed but he didn’t go much further. Justine stopped at the store for groceries on her way home from work, sometimes at ten at night. She spent her days off doing laundry, and if she couldn’t stay up until midnight working on briefs, she’d get up at four in the morning to work. And then Scott would criticize her for not working out and complain about the toll her long hours took on the family. But he somehow justified an expensive country club membership. Scott did most of the cooking, but it wasn’t much of an effort. He didn’t like labor-intensive meals after a rugged day of playing golf. Adele witnessed a lot of those squabbles because she was a frequent babysitter when her nieces were little.
But none of that was Adele’s fault! Now she feared Justine would go back on her promises and take advantage of her again.
She thought about canceling the movie date with Jake because she knew she wouldn’t be good company, but she didn’t have the heart after he’d been so sweet to offer. So she got dressed and was ready when he picked her up. “What are we going to see?” she asked when she got in the car.
“Anything you want. There are plenty of sexy leading men for you to choose from,” he said. Then he grinned.
“Anything is fine.”
So they chose the latest hit movie, bought popcorn and drinks, and she stared at the screen blankly. He asked her three times what was wrong, and three times she said she just had things on her mind. The movie was over before she’d really let herself enjoy it. Jake grabbed her hand and said, “Come on.” He pulled her up and out of their row, out of the theater into the dimly lit hall that led to the lobby. “We’re going to Maggio’s. We’ll get a dark booth in the back and talk. Whatever it is, it’s better to get it out.”
“What makes you say that? I’m a little moody, that’s all. You’ve seen me—”
He was shaking his head. “You’re not just moody,” he said. “Any time you don’t stare with big cow eyes at Bradley Cooper, the man you hope to marry, we’ve got us a problem. So, we’ll go have a little wine. Maybe some pasta or pizza but wine for sure.”
She raised a brow. “You think you’re going to get me loose and talking?”
He nodded. “As only a good friend could.”
They drove to Maggio’s, a little hole-in-the-wall Italian pizzeria. It was one of his favorite places. Jake pulled his truck into a small parking lot behind the restaurant. They did a huge take-out business, but there was a small dining room with only eight booths. It was compact, each booth could hold six people so the maximum they could serve wasn’t even fifty, and in all the years Adele had known about the restaurant, it had never been full. The front of the store, where people picked up their meals or pizzas, was always hopping, and there were a couple of tables on the wide sidewalk where people could sit outside in nice weather.
Adele and Jake entered through the back door because Jake knew the owners and most of the staff. People hollered “Hey, Jake” or waved a hand in their direction. They slipped into the restaurant and found a booth near the back. Adele loved that it was dimly lit and decorated with plastic grapes. They slid into the booth and sat across from each other.
“Hey, Jake,” the waitress said, slapping down a couple of napkins. “Haven’t seen you in a long time.”
“It hasn’t been that long, has it?” he returned. “You know my friend Adele, don’t you?”
“Yeah, sure, how you doin’? And what can I start you off with?”
“A glass of cabernet for me,” Addie said.
“Same,” Jake said. “And we’ll look at the menu for a while.”
“I bet you know it by heart, Jake,” she said, smiling prettily into his eyes. “I’ll be right back.”
“All the women in town like you,” Adele said. “Why don’t you ever take any of them out?”
“They don’t all like me,” he said. “And Bonnie, there, I think she’s been married a bunch of times.”
“Really?” Adele asked.
“Well, at least twice. Been there, done that.”
Adele remembered too well—it was a scandal in the neighborhood at the time. Jake was in his midtwenties, Adele still in high school, when he married Mary Ellen. It didn’t go well. Jake’s mother complained to Adele’s mother that there was a lot of bickering, and in no time Mary Ellen had become Jake’s unhappy wife. Though she never missed a word of their mothers’ gossip, the only thing she actually saw was that her friend Jake was suddenly alone, miserable, brokenhearted and inconsolable. Mary Ellen left him after a year, and they were divorced by two years. She had now passed her third divorce, been with numerous men she hadn’t married and was said to be keeping company with a much older guy who left his wife of almost forty years for her.
“Yeah, I’d love to know what happened there, if only to understand it,” Adele said. Jake was handsome, sweet natured, smart and most importantly, kind. His market was like the cornerstone of the older section of Half Moon Bay. He’d served on the city council for a couple of years and was greatly respected. By comparison, Mary Ellen was attractive but not very smart. But she must have some serious skills—she certainly had no trouble getting a guy though she did have a short attention span. Adele suspected an abundance of pheromones. She also seemed to be cunning.
“Maybe when I understand what happened, I’ll share,” Jake said.
Their drinks came, they ordered a pizza to share and Jake went in for the kill. “How about if you tell me why you didn’t drool over Bradley,” Jake said.
She told him Justine had come by for a brief visit, complaining about having some job and therefore financial issues, and that she might not be helping out as much as Adele had expected. “It emphasized all the things I haven’t done,” she said. “I was going to change my life, you know—starting with a makeover of myself and the house. Neither has had much attention for the past few years. I was waiting for the inspiration to kick in.”
“We’ve been over this,” Jake said. “You have plenty of time for all that. And you don’t need a makeover. The house could use a little paint, but other than that...”
“I haven’t even made a list,” she said. “I kept thinking I was making plans but they were just fantasies. Plans require at least a list. Not to mention the purchase of a bucket of paint...”
“Well then, let’s talk about what you’d like to do and you can go home and make a list, but Addie, stuff like this doesn’t usually cause you to ignore a good movie. Or—” The pizza arrived just as he finished his thought. “Or ignore your best guy, Bradley.” He peeled off a piece of pizza and gestured toward her plate. “I can help with this, you know. I remodeled my mother’s house, and I’ve done a lot of my own work in my house.”
“You’re so busy,” she said, chomping off a mouthful of pizza.
“Even if I’m not available to pound nails or paint trim, I know a lot of contractors, who to call, where to find them, and if you ever run into a problem—I know how to talk to them. You never saw my mother’s house after I did the kitchen and both bathrooms. Damn good for a grocer, if you ask me.”