Janice Macdonald - Return To Little Hills

“Where’s the chicken potpie?” Maude had picked up the menu again. “How much is it?”

“We don’t have chicken potpie,” the kid said.

“Chicken potpie,” Maude said. “And a cup of coffee.”

“They don’t have chicken potpie,” Edie told Maude. “Why don’t you just have fish and chips like you always do?”

Maude eyed Edie, a tad suspiciously. “What are you having?”

Edie felt her hand move almost involuntarily to her head. She restrained it. “I’m having salad, Mom. I already told you.”

Maude screwed up her face as if she’d just learned that her daughter was going to dine on stewed yak. “Salad?”

“Salad.”

“I don’t want salad. I’ll have chicken potpie.”

Edie slapped her head. “Mom! Look at me. They don’t have chicken potpie.”

“Don’t shout at me.” Maude raised her eyes to the waiter. “See how my daughter talks to me?”

“Want me to come back in a few minutes?” he said.

“No,” Edie said. “She’ll have fish and chips.”

“I don’t know though.” Maude was browsing the menu again. “The last time I had chicken potpie here it had bits of green pepper in it. I think I’ll just have the fish and chips. Edie, that man across the street keeps looking at you.”

Edie looked beyond the dancing pies to see Peter Darling leaving the hardware shop, smiling broadly. She realized with irritation, now back and in plentiful supply, that her hair was lank and unwashed, she had on no makeup and that she was wearing tatty elephant-colored sweats. She drank some water and slouched down in the booth as Peter approached. The life of the foreign correspondent wasn’t always glamorous and exotic.

AS HE APPROACHED the booth where Edie sat opposite an elderly woman in a natty white knitted hat, Peter acknowledged, reluctantly, that Edie did not appear overjoyed to see him. By contrast, her companion was all smiles as she patted the booth beside her.

“Didn’t recognize you from across the road,” she said. “You’re that assistant principal at my son-in-law’s school. Saw you when my other daughter took me there so she could drop off Ray’s lunch. He’s on a low-sodium diet. You met Edie? She’s a foreign correspondent, got shot at last year. I’m having the fish and chips. Edie’s having the chicken potpie.”

“Mmm.” He met Edie’s eyes across the table. As he remembered, they were amber, only slightly lighter than her hair. “I wasn’t really hungry, but I quite like chicken potpie.”

“They don’t have chicken potpie.” Edie looked as if she might have a headache. “I’m having a salad.”

“If you don’t mind the green peppers, the chicken potpie is good,” Maude said.

“I think I’m going to sit here and go quietly insane,” Edie said. “Hi, Peter. This is my mother, Maude Robinson, in case you weren’t previously introduced. Mom—” she leaned across the table to Maude “—you remember Peter Darling?” She looked at Peter again. “School day over already?”

“No,” he said. “I just came for the chicken potpie.”

“Don’t do this,” she said.

“You ever seen Edith slap her head?” Maude asked. “That’s what she did just before you got here. I said I wanted fish and chips and she slaps her head. She shouted at me, too.”

“I should be locked away,” Edie said. “What are you doing here?”

“I placed two students at the hardware shop across the street,” he said. “It’s a great arrangement. The school district partially subsidizes the shop owner. He gets a couple of assistants and the students get some real work experience while earning credits toward graduation.”

She eyed him for a moment. “That must be gratifying.”

He looked straight back at her. “It is. Very.”

“I meant it sincerely,” she said. “I wasn’t being facetious.”

“I didn’t suspect for a moment that you were,” he lied. Edie disquieted him. It was nothing overt; an enigmatic smile, the faint whiff of cynicism about her. He imagined that she saw him as painfully earnest, which he supposed he was. Well, earnest—not painfully, he hoped. Perhaps he should cultivate a new persona. Cavalier and brutish. Take that insolent smirk off your face, wench, and get thee to the bedchamber.

“My daughters both think I’m a senile old woman who doesn’t have a clue in the world what’s going on right in front of her eyes,” Maude said. “They’re trying to put me in a home.”

Edie set down her water glass. The air went still. Peter tried to think of something to say. At his side, the old woman was sipping water, seemingly unaware that she’d just sparked a match to the conversational tinderbox.

“Edith hasn’t been back here for donkey’s years,” the elderly woman said. “Too busy with her high-powered job. Now she decides it’s time for poor old mom to be put away, so she comes out here to drag me around to these fancy high-priced places that are nothing more than storage rooms where you sit around and wait to die.”

“Are you living in your own home at the moment?” Peter asked, trying only to defuse the tension. He didn’t look at Edie, but he could feel her presence, glowering across the table. Beside him, Maude fiddled with her ear.

“Sorry. It’s not that I’m deaf. I only wear my hearing aid when there’s something I want to hear. Do I rent? No, I own my home. My husband and I bought it when our oldest daughter, Vivian, was born. Both the girls were raised in that house and now they’re trying to make me move out—”

“Mom, that’s absolutely not true,” Edie said. “That’s what we’ve been talking about. That’s why I’m back. Viv said you want to move—”

“I didn’t until she started showing me all these fancy brochures and then you come back and…” She looked at Peter. “Now they’re both on at me. I never said stick me in a warehouse though, did I?” She glared at Edie. “I didn’t say come out here and turn my life upside down—”

“Ah, food,” Edie announced as the kid waiter approached. “Too bad I’m suddenly not hungry.”

HALF AN HOUR, still shaking with anger, Edie helped Maude back into the car. As she walked around to the driver’s side, Peter caught her arm. He’d gamely sat through the meal, engaging Maude in small talk about roses and gardening and preventing an incendiary situation from erupting into a wildfire. As they were leaving the restaurant, Maude had invited him and his daughters to dinner. Edie had been too furious to even listen for his reply. She looked at him for a moment, not trusting herself to speak.

“So.” She forced a bright smile. “Here you have the real truth. Heartless daughters evict poor old mother…no, daughter. Singular. As Maude would have told you if you’d waited a little longer, Viv would never be so cruel. But then Viv didn’t kill her father. Funny how Mom’s never quite forgiven me for that.” She stopped, appalled at what she’d just said. She could see confusion in Peter’s face and something else, something tender and soft that made her want to run. “Sorry for that little outburst,” she said. “Could we please rewind the tape?”

“Consider it done.” His hand was on the top of the car now. He hadn’t taken his eyes from her face. “It would be an understatement to say you’ve got a tricky situation, and I don’t want to interfere in a family matter. But, if you need someone to talk to, you know where to find me.”

“Thanks.”

“I mean that.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a card and scribbled something on the back. “That’s my number at home.” He handed the card to Edie. “You’re likely to get one of my daughters, and if it’s Delphina, she’ll want very much to read you a poem. She’s quite talented. Of course, she’ll be too shy to tell you that…but with a little coaching, you can draw her out.”