Janet Evanovich - Love in a Nutshell

It was nearly six, and a pot of beef stew simmered in the kitchen. Kate had thrown in a jar of cocktail onions and some red wine, hoping she could fake her mom into thinking it was a classic boeuf bourguignon. Mom had always been all about dinner being a sit-down meal, even if the house had been falling down around them. When she was a kid, it sometimes seemed inconvenient. Now, she realized it was one of the best parts of her childhood-a constant in her adolescent life that made her feel safe and protected.

Kate smoothed her hands over the black pencil skirt, which she’d last worn when working at Detroit Monthly . Mom didn’t believe in jeans, paper napkins, or ketchup at the dinner table. As a teen, Kate had tried to assure her mother that all those things were perfectly real and even kind of cool. Mom had never bought in.

Tonight, Kate didn’t mind being dressed up. If nothing else, the change in wardrobe kept it front and center in her mind that she’d been right not to expose Matt to this. Somehow, she couldn’t picture him wearing a button-down shirt just to eat beef stew.

Stella’s ears perked at the sound of a car in the drive. She trotted toward the fd tt picture ront door and gave a welcoming yip.

Kate gave the dog a gentle pat. “Sure, it’s all happiness and sunshine, now. But let’s see what tune you’re singing by turkey day.” The truth was, she was excited, too.

Kate pulled on her jacket and went outside to greet her parents. Stella, who wasn’t a fan of the icy wind off the lake, lurked indoors.

Though Kate had visited with her parents just a handful of months ago, she felt a surprising sense of nostalgia seeing them here, at The Nutshell. The years had treated her father well. With his Florida tan, silver hair, and aristocratic features, he still reminded Kate of a diplomat in the foreign service.

Mom was no slacker, either. Her hair might have tipped the scales from blond to gray, but otherwise, she looked much as she had when Kate was a teen. And she still stood a good four inches taller than Kate, too.

After hugs and greetings, Kate looked into the back of the SUV her dad had rented.

“That sure is a lot of luggage, Mom,” Kate said.

Kate’s mom removed a suiter from the back. “It might seem excessive, but you never know what events might pop up and how the weather might be.”

“In this case, not many events and freezing would be good bets.” Kate glanced at her mom’s pale pink and very thin cardigan sweater. “Do you have a coat in one of those suitcases?”

“I have another sweater or two, but I left my mink in cold storage.”

Kate was no fan of furs, but if her mom had to wear one, now would be the time. “You can borrow one of my jackets while you’re here.”

“That’s all right. I’ll ring up Bunny and ask her to bring something appropriate,” Mom said. “In the meantime, your father and I can pretend we’re snowbound and stay indoors. It could be very romantic.”

Kate put her muscles to work, helping her dad haul the luggage. In the time it took them to get everything inside, Stella had fallen asleep on her mom’s lap.

Kate’s mother sat on the flowery sofa, stroking Stella. “Your dog’s a charmer, Kate. What do you think I should get her for Christmas?”

“Anything in cashmere would probably do.”

Her mother laughed. “Well, naturally. She is an Appleton female. And how about you?”

“I… uh… Let me get back to you on that one.” Kate couldn’t think of the last time her mother had gotten her anything other than a gift card. Of course, she also couldn’t recall when she’d gotten her mother anything other than a silk scarf. “Why don’t you two get settled in, and I’ll get dinner on the table?”

Half an hour later, after her parents had their cocktails in hand, tilsget dinnehe family sat down to Kate’s fake boeuf bourguignon . The onions tasted weird even to Kate, but no one mentioned them. In fact, her dad said that stew made the perfect meal when snowed in. Never mind that they weren’t really snowed in, and that Kate had started the stew hours before their arrival.

Toward the end of the meal, Kate’s dad stuck an old Johnny Mathis album on the stereo. “Katie, the house looks just great. Better than I remember. I really think you could make your plan to turn this place into a B &B work.”

He turned to Kate’s mom. “Remember seeing Johnny perform that winter in Lake Tahoe?”

The two of them shared a smile and clasped hands on the tabletop. Kate pushed around the onions in her stew, not wanting to break into their moment.

“Kate, if you’ll excuse us, your mother and I need to have this dance. And don’t worry about clearing the table. We’ll do that… later.”

“Sure,” Kate said. “I’ll just go take care of some stuff in my room.” She didn’t feel like telling them right now about Matt and his plans to turn the house into a restaurant.

She listened to her parents laugh through the walls of her room. If this was to be a nightly event while playing snowed-in, Kate was going to need more chips and chocolate in her stash. For crying out loud. These people were her parents.

ACCORDING TO Kate’s clock, it was now ten at night. It felt more like three in the morning. Kate was bored out of her mind. The music downstairs was still going strong, though her parents had moved on to Frank Sinatra.

For lack of anything else to do, Kate dumped her purse onto the dresser and began to sort through the bag’s contents. A cleaning might make it weigh less than a ton. Kate pulled out her wallet, makeup bag, and the notepad she carried to write “to do” lists that she could then ignore. At the purse’s bottom, in a nest of pennies and market receipts, lay the letter from her mom that she’d tucked away and never finished reading.

“Now’s as good a time as any.”

Kate settled on the bed. Because she’d already heard a fresh update on all nieces and nephews during dinner, she fast-forwarded past the opening chat and the bit where her mom wished that Kate would have gotten a business degree.

But there’s no remaking the past. Your road won’t be as easy as mine, her mother wrote. Still, I know you’re up to the challenge. Yes, you’ve been struggling, and it was obvious to both your father and me how much it upset you to ask us for help. But we were happy to give it, darling. And though it’s not kind to say, neither your father nor I were especially fond of Richard. He tended to try to build himself up at your expense. You’ll be a happier woman without him.

“You’ve got that right,” Kate said.

=”0nstairs

I think in many ways, I envy you, Kate. You have a spirit I didn’t have at your age. Oh, I had my moments, but you have me beat. You also have the determination to weather the tough times. I’m not so sure I would have had your sort of grit. I am very proud of you. I need to tell you that more often, and you need to begin believing it. Then we’ll rule the world.

Kate smiled. Maybe she could imagine her mother dancing on tabletops, after all. And maybe she had been wrong about her parents all these years. It wasn’t that they thought she couldn’t do anything, it was that they thought she could do everything.

A WHILE before midnight, Matt sat alone at his closed bar nursing a tall glass of water. Since Kate had moved out, his universe had been totally jacked up. He’d even been feeling sorry for himself, which was a new and unpleasant sensation.

When the cuckoo clock over the bar struck twelve, Matt planned to get the hell over this. Somehow. And in the meantime, he’d watch the clock’s minute hand move.