Worry blossomed inside Alex like a noxious weed in Caroline’s garden. This was not like her mother, usually the epitome of easy grace. Something was up.
“What’s going on? You’re acting like you’ve already had about a dozen cups of tea this morning.”
Mary Ella set her tea—cup, saucer and all—onto the small table between them and tucked a strand of tastefully colored auburn hair behind her ear with fingers that trembled. “This is hard. Harder than I thought it would be.”
That noxious weed of worry grew into a bristly, towering stalk. Something was seriously wrong. Cancer was the first thing that came to mind, maybe because of Caroline or because she had just seen Sam, who had tragically lost his young wife to the devil disease, though she didn’t really have confirmation of that yet.
“What is it? Are you ill?” How would she bear it if she lost her mother? Mary Ella was in her sixties, yes, but she was healthier than the rest of them and still walked four miles every morning and lifted weights at the gym three times a week.
“I’m trying to talk to each of you children separately. I’ve already called and spoken with Lila and Rose. I had a moment last night to talk to Maura and Angie and I’m going over to Riley’s after I talk to you. It doesn’t get easier, I can tell you that.”
Panic fluttered inside her, dark and ugly, and she thought she just might be sick herself. “Is it cancer? If it is, I’ll be there for you every minute. You know I will. I’ll drive you to the chemo, I’ll fix you anything that sounds good that you think you might be able to eat. I’ll even shave my head when your hair falls out.”
Mary Ella’s eyes had gone wide during this little speech and if Alex wasn’t mistaken, sudden tears swam in them. Her mother gave a shocked little laugh and reached for her hand.
Those fingers trembling in hers didn’t set her mind at ease. “Oh, darling. I don’t have cancer, but if I did, I would absolutely want you at my back. You have always been such a wonderful daughter. I couldn’t ask for better children. All of you.”
For a time in those rough teen years, she hadn’t treated her mother very well and the memory still ate at her.
“Okay. Okay. You don’t have cancer.” Relief flooded through the panic. “What’s this about, then?”
“I feel silly, especially now after that little side trip into terrible possibilities. I don’t have cancer, I promise. Everything’s fine. Better than fine, actually.”
Mary Ella’s throat worked as she swallowed hard. “It’s just... I don’t know quite how to say this but...I’m getting married.”
She stared for several long seconds as the words soaked into her brain, not quite sure how to react.
The news wasn’t really unexpected. Mary Ella had been in a relationship for a year now, but accepting something as an inevitable outcome in the abstract was far different from being faced with the blunt reality of it.
“Does Harry know?” she finally quipped.
Mary Ella made a face. “Very funny. Yes. He’s been asking me since Christmas. I just... It took me a long time to feel comfortable saying yes.”
Their romance had shocked everyone in town, especially because Mary Ella had made no secret the past twenty years of her contempt for the man. She had always considered him greedy and soulless, someone who had betrayed his own son, traded his family away for a handful of gold.
Something had shifted between them the year before, however, around the time Harry’s son, Jackson, had come back into Maura’s life after he discovered they shared a daughter, Sage.
Tension tightened her mother’s features and Alex knew Mary Ella was waiting for some other response from her than a joke. She didn’t quite know what to say. Those strained and difficult teenage years aside, she loved her mother dearly and wasn’t sure Harry Lange was good enough for her.
“Are you...okay with it?” Mary Ella finally asked.
She gave a rueful shake of her head, squeezing her mother’s fingers. “I don’t know, Mom,” she said. “Don’t you think you could hold out for someone a little more financially secure who might take better care of you in your old age so we don’t have to?”
Mary Ella chuckled, some of the tautness of her muscles easing a little at Alex’s light tone. “I don’t care about his money. Harry knows that. I hope my own children do, too.”
“You know I’m teasing, Mom. Though if you were any other woman, I might suspect you of marrying him just to get your hands on his Sarah Colville paintings.”
“I’m considering that a very big bonus. I’m marrying the man I love and in the process gaining an entire houseful of paintings by my favorite artist.”