Cupid’s Confederates

Thanksgiving…”

The pause was Bett’s cue to give in. Not that there would be an argument if she didn’t. Just very gentle needling, perhaps a sentimental blur of tears in her mother’s eyes for scorned traditions, and the unconscious message that Bett was doing something wrong. Like a sponge, Bett had always soaked up guilt. Obviously, there was something terribly wrong with her for wanting to make stuffing without raisins.

Raisins?

Bett suddenly felt sick. She’d planned a tactful confrontation with her mom, but, truthfully, over something far more heroic than dried fruit.

“Each to her own taste,” she said mildly, thinking that perhaps it was easier to start with the little things. In your house, your way, darling. In my house, mine. The first bridge was just saying it aloud.

She glanced over her shoulder after a moment or two. Her mother was staring at her with an odd expression as Bett stuffed the raisinless mixture into the bird.

“I have a story to tell you,” Bett continued cheerfully. “The very first year we were married, I cooked Thanksgiving turkey for Zach. I got out two cookbooks and memorized the instructions and told Zach I didn’t want any help. I must have basted the thing every two minutes; it was a miracle it ever cooked, but that’s neither here nor there. You never let me in the kitchen as a kid, Mom, more’s the pity. I didn’t realize the turkey was…um… hollow inside. Much less than there was anything inside the holes…”

Her mother’s mouth was slowly starting to curve into a smile; so was Bett’s. “I called Zach in to carve when it was done, so proud of myself. He said he’d first get the stuffing out for me, so out came the heart and gizzard and neck and all, still in the paper bag. Very well cooked they were. So was the paper bag. What on earth is that? I asked him…”

Elizabeth started laughing. So did Bett. Bridge two, she thought wryly. Mom, I would like to announce that you have a daughter capable of doing some very foolish things. I don’t want your damn approval. I just want to share.

Her mother’s eyes were sparkling with laughter. “Why didn’t you tell me that before? Sweetheart, did I ever tell you the story of when I was first married…”

No, she’d never told Bett the story. Bett had always been under the impression that her mother never made mistakes in the kitchen, that Elizabeth had been born with the ruthless efficiency to manage a faultless house. Bett’s eyes flickered to the table. Zach had left the kitchen. She wished he were there. She wanted him to see that she had heard him, that the small bridges were being mended.

Her mother suddenly reached over and hugged her, and Bett hugged back. “Brittany, we’re going to have a wonderful day!” Elizabeth announced.

Bett was suddenly not quite so unhappy that Zach had disappeared. All the bridges didn’t have to do with Zach. Her relationship with her mother was separate in itself.

Her heart was in both corners, but there was no question, not for an instant, where her priorities were.

She loved her mother; Zach was her life.

***

“That was an absolutely wonderful dinner!” Wynn Hawthorne pushed himself back from the table, patted his stomach, his white head shaking in appreciation.

Wynn was a retired insurance man, with all the gregarious conversation that went with his trade. Bob Lake owned a local processing plant; he seemed a quiet, austere man, and he’d lost his wife three years ago. Garth Hawkins, the bearded giant, had four generations of fanning behind him.

Heaven only knew why Bett had thought they would blend at the table over a Thanksgiving feast. They did have one thing in common-being lonely strays-but only a manic optimist would have believed that was enough. Not that talk hadn’t flowed easily enough, but Elizabeth was sitting silently on the other side of the table, rarely drawn into the conversation. She seemed to lack any interest in any of them…actually, to an almost unusual degree. Once Elizabeth got over her shyness, she’d always been naturally curious about people.

Awkwardly, Bett stood up. “Dessert, everyone?” Awkwardly, she started to clear the plates. “Awkwardly” summed up the entire afternoon, and she felt ridiculously close to tears. She’d been swamped with chores in the kitchen all morning; there hadn’t been an instant to talk with Zach. Twice he’d walked in-once the blender had been roaring, and the second time Billy Oaks had popped in the door. His mother obviously had kicked him out so she could prepare her own Thanksgiving feast in relative peace; in the meantime, he’d brought the thriving raccoons over to show Bett. Of course, they’d gotten loose in the kitchen.

She hadn’t seen Zach again until she was letting their company in the front door. Her dress was dark red, a velvet jersey. It had stitching under the bodice that almost made her look busty, a gentle flow to the skirt, feminine medieval sleeves, a soft V to the neck. She could not conceivably look better. She’d violently threatened her hair to stay in its pins; tiny strands curled around her cheeks and the nape of her neck; mascara and shadow highlighted every seductive potential she had in her eyes; and she’d applied perfume lightly in every wicked hollow.

Zach hadn’t noticed.

She looked perfectly beautiful, and he hadn’t noticed. The three men had arrived on top of each other; she should have guessed why. Halftime. She’d managed to set the turkey on the table between football games, as she expected half the women in the nation were doing. That part was fine, or at least sort of fine.

She’d just had different expectations of the entire feast. It was her menu, her organization of the dinner and the house and hostessing the guests; she wanted Zach to see that. She’d had hopes that the guests would keep her mother entertained, and she would have a little one- on-one time with Zach; Zach was going to have an easy, relaxed meal and Bett was going to confidently, brilliantly, handle the peripherals and when the day was finally over they would talk.

Only the plan had crumbled. Wynn kept throwing an arm around her shoulders; she hated men who touched so carelessly. Garth was pompous and just never stopped talking, and Bob was a military enthusiast who conjured up world wars for enjoyment.

Before they’d been invited to dinner, her guests had certainly given very different impressions. As she scraped the plates in the kitchen, Bett decided glumly that all men showed their true colors when put in front of a football game. The next time she vetted someone for her mother, it was going to be at a fourth-and-goal in front of a TV set. In the meantime, Zach’s relaxed dinner had gone by the wayside. Zach was not a military enthusiast, hated pompous people, and his repeated icy stares at Wynn could have refrozen the turkey.

Elizabeth carried in another round of empty dessert plates, her cheeks flaming. “Did you hear what that Garth said?” she hissed.

Bett nodded. Garth liked simple talk-all four-letter words. Who would have expected that of Susan Lee’s brother-in-law’s cousin? “Now, I know he wouldn’t deliberately offend you, Mom. It’s just his way of talking.”

“We should have salted his turkey with detergent,” Elizabeth announced blandly.

A wisp of a smile appeared on Bett’s face at the idea, but it quickly faded.

“What’s wrong with your hair?” her mother asked curiously.

Bett’s fingers raced up to her hairpins. The ones that were all sort of hanging in midair. “Nothing.” She pulled them out, one by one. Who cared? The day was destroyed. Her grand visions of handling the holiday had gone the way of dust. It was her house; she was in control; they were about to go back to living the way she and Zach liked to live; and her mother was going to be well loved but ousted-gently-from the director’s chair. This was not a movie set.

Fine.

Only seeing was believing, and how could Zach possibly believe she had such monumental changes in mind after the hours that had just passed? She had to talk to him.

“They’ve settled into another football game,” Elizabeth remarked.

Of course.