Clare O’Donohue - The Lover’s Knot

Maggie gave me the directions to her son's house as soon as we got in the car, and then we drifted into an uncomfortable silence. She fidgeted with her purse and looked out the window. I stared straight ahead at the road. Alone with her for the first time, I felt a little like a school child, afraid to talk in case she "sssh'd" me. With the members of the quilt club she seemed like a different person, relaxed, younger. But with me, she was every bit the stern librarian she'd once been.

"Is this the son who's a state representative?" I finally asked.

"It is, but that's just a stopping point. He'll be governor one day," she said proudly.

"My grandmother told me you have quite accomplished kids. Your son, plus a doctor, two lawyers, and an artist."

"Sheila isn't a artist. She owns a kind of art gallery. She doesn't actually make the art herself." There was a vague disapproval in her voice, but it quickly softened. "She does have a good eye, though. She always finds something."

"I wanted to be an artist when I was a kid. I used to love to paint. In fact, when I moved to New York I wanted to work in an art gallery, " I confessed. "Hanging out with artists all day seemed really fun. But I couldn't find a job, and I guess I sort of took a different road."

"You have time to choose whatever road you like." She took a deep breath and changed the subject. "I wonder if Eleanor knows what she's doing. She takes people at their word, an admirable quality if she isn't being lied to."

"What do you mean?"

"That's it on the left," directed Maggie, and I pulled over to a pretty brick house with a well-tended garden.

"Maggie, can you please tell me what you meant?" I asked again.

"I didn't mean anything, except I think that Eleanor needs to be careful, and if she won't be careful, then you need to be careful for her."

"Well, that certainly clears things up for me," I said as Maggie got out of the car.

"You have her sarcasm," Maggie said. "Never cared for that in Eleanor." She started to frown, but instead she shook her head and smiled. "You really are like her."

I laughed. "Is that a compliment?"

Maggie laughed back. "Sometimes," she said, and headed toward her son's house.

"I hear that you've been getting me out of trouble," my grandmother shouted to me as I walked in the house. "And getting yourself into it."

I peered into the living room, but she wasn't there. I walked back to the kitchen. She was hobbling around on her crutches, making sandwiches.

"What trouble am I in?" She pointed to my bandaged hand as she took a slice of bread from the loaf.

"I can do that. You shouldn't even be out of bed." I took the bread out of her hand. "What trouble did I get you out of?"

"At the shop. I guess Marc was a little enthusiastic. I hear you smoothed things over with the girls."

"I did good?" I was not about to let a possible compliment go unnoticed.

"No, you were just happy to see Marc, but you got me out of trouble anyway by putting off the renovation until Saturday. It gives everyone a chance to get used to it."

For just an instant I felt the need to deny my interest in Marc, then I decided it was better to let the comment pass. My grandmother was right, and she knew it. There wasn't any point in trying to explain something I didn't even understand myself. "You kind of surprised me too, hiring Marc," I said as I cut a pat of butter.

"You're doing it wrong." Eleanor had moved on to my sandwich-making skills.

"How could I be doing it wrong?" I was spreading butter on bread, not exactly a skill requiring an advanced degree.

"Less butter, and do both sides-it keeps the sandwich moister that way."

"Have you ever stopped to consider that we simply have different, yet equal, sandwich-making techniques?"

"Not really, no."

I buttered both sides her way, put the turkey and tomato slices on the sandwich, and cut it on the diagonal, as instructed. Eleanor sniffed at it a bit, refused to say anything nice about it, but finished it in seconds.

"I'm dying to hear what you and Marc have planned for the shop," I finally admitted.

A glint came into her eye. "We'll cut a hole in the wall, make a doorway to the other side, and add shelves for more fabric." She started sketching on a napkin. "And here in the back we'll build an office where the kitchen was, and next to it there will be a small classroom."

"Is Marc doing all this?"

She made a face at me. "Don't get too attached."

"I'm not attached. I just wonder if he's up to the task."

"Well, when he called me he was so enthusiastic. He really wants the chance to prove his worth, and I like that. No one thought I could run a quilt shop, a widow with two small children and no experience running a business. But I did okay. Sometimes you have to give people a chance."

"I don't think Maggie likes him. Or Natalie."

"Well, they have their opinions." She turned back to the napkin and a subject she clearly preferred. "I want to put up a whole wall of quilting tools, but I can't decide where."

"I have some ideas," I said. Eleanor smiled and handed me the pen, and together we arranged and rearranged the shop until every detail was worked out.

"This is a great plan, but it's a little ambitious, especially for the crew you've got. Marc isn't a real contractor, Nancy's never run a business before and, let's face it, I don't know anything about any of it."

"I'm not worried about any of you," she said, and then smiled. "Well, I'm not worried about Marc or Nancy. Your sandwich-making abilities are a little sad."

Over the next several days I split my time between doing my grandmother's errands and being her spy at the shop. Nancy complained hourly about the noise Marc was making next door as he pulled old booths and kitchen equipment from the diner. For each regular who came by to express her excitement about the shop expansion, another would predict dire consequences-it was too much work for Eleanor, it would be difficult to make enough money to pay for expansion, it would ruin the coziness of the place.

We closed the shop on Wednesday and I drove Eleanor over to sit in a corner and bark orders while Nancy and I did the inventory. Nancy spread boxes on the floor and began sorting the fabrics into categories from Christmas to children to plaids. When I incorrectly identified a fabric with ducks on it as children's, rather than Easter, I was taken off fabric duty. Instead Eleanor had me sort through the quilting tools. It was amazing to me that despite the seeming chaos, everything was catalogued and accounted for. When the inventory was done, there wasn't one missing pack of needles or thread color anywhere.

"I'll make one more check downstairs," I said.

"Be careful, Nell," Eleanor shouted after me. "I mean it."

She didn't have to warn me. Not since I'd fallen down the stairs myself, not that Eleanor knew that. Nancy had done an amazing job of bringing all the boxes upstairs and the place was clean and empty. But when I peeked into the little office on the side, I found another story. Boxes were half-packed with old files and binders, and a large box in the corner was filled with cut-up pieces of fabrics and threads. It seemed like a job for Nancy, who would have a better idea which, if any, of this stuff was worth keeping.

"We should start taking stuff to the car," I said as I came back upstairs.

"Remember to put supplies for the quilt club in a separate box," Eleanor directed.

"Like what kind of supplies?"

Nancy handed me an empty box, then began pointing out a variety of rulers, rubber mats, and rotary cutters. "You'll also need a good pair of these," she said, and handed me heavy metal scissors.