The Idea of Love Read online

  “It’s okay,” Ella said. And it was okay. Knowing why this little guy was barking seemed to make all the difference.

  “It’s not, but it’s nice for you to say so, dear.” Mimi put Bruiser on the ground. “He’s not barking now because I gave him a sedative, but it won’t last long. Beware.”

  “Forewarned,” Ella said.

  Mimi placed a kettle on the stove and hummed under her breath, a song Ella recognized but couldn’t name. “So how did you come to live here?” Mimi asked.

  “To Crumbling Chateau?”

  “I like to call it Manderley,” Mimi said.

  “From Rebecca!”

  “The very one. I like to think that everything has a past. Even a place as downtrodden as this. So, what brings you to Grumbling Gateau?”

  She liked this Mimi.

  “My husband left me,” Ella said. “I had a day to find a place to live. This was open and cheap. A short story, I’m afraid.”

  “Ah, exactly why I came.”

  “Your husband?”

  “No!” She waved her hand in the air. “Never had one of those. I had a bookstore here in town. It closed and I needed somewhere fast and cheap. That was twelve years ago.”

  “I heard we once had a bookstore. Where was it?”

  “In the town square, two doors down from the defunct movie theater.”

  “Why did it close?”

  “Oh, for all the reasons bookstores close these days. I couldn’t make enough money to keep it afloat. They mourn when it’s gone but don’t help to keep it. I hear it’s the same everywhere. But it still was a great loss to me.”

  “I’m sorry. That’s rough.” Ella sat on a kitchen chair and watched Mimi prepare the loose tea leaves, scooping them out of a tin and placing them in an infuser ball, which she dipped in and out of the boiling water until she seemed satisfied with the timing. She placed a cup in front of Ella. “Milk? Sugar?”

  “Milk would be nice.”

  Mimi opened the refrigerator. There were two bottles of water, a container of strawberries, and a quart of milk, which she handed to Ella.

  “Yes, everyone went to my store when they were kids but not when they were adults. Everyone just stopped coming.” Mimi shrugged. “Everything changes. It’s a law of life.”

  “A law of life.” Ella took a sip of her tea and her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “This is delicious”

  “Rose petals. That’s the secret.” Mimi smiled.

  “So you moved here after you closed the store?” Ella asked.

  “Yes.”

  Ella wanted more. She wanted to know how this woman got over such a setback and still stayed this damn happy. She wanted to know how she lived in a place like this when she’d never planned on such a life. She wanted more than a “Yes.” Ella prodded. “So you like it here?”

  “It’s a great place to live, what with the convenience to everything and the big windows. This was once the most beautiful building in town.”

  “It’s not anymore,” Ella said.

  “Well, there are so many great things about it. I mean, look out my window—if you crank your neck to the left and then lean against the glass, you can see the river. Plus the market and almost anything you need is within walking distance. And this building.” She knocked on the floor with a stomp of her soft shoe. “Sturdy as a rock.”

  “A crumbling rock,” Ella said, and smiled. “Okay, I get it. You obviously can see good in anything. I just keep thinking about my house and my stuff and all I’ve lost. It’s hard to think about…” Ella stopped. She didn’t want to unload her misery on a stranger.

  “I know.” Mimi said as if she really did know. “So where were you coming from this evening that made you finally knock on my door?” Mimi asked.

  “I guess it was a date. But not really. A pretend date like when I made my Barbie doll go out with G. I. Joe to the Barbie camper for a picnic. Nothing real.”

  Mimi laughed so loudly that Ella startled, spilled a little tea on the table. “What wasn’t real about it?” Mimi asked.

  “He thought I was someone else.”

  “Now this is the most interesting part of my day or year maybe.”

  “I met this man and he wanted a tour of Watersend. Because he was a stranger and I thought I’d never see him again, I told him what I wanted to be true instead of what was true.”

  “But then you saw him again.”

  “And again.”

  “Oh, my, this is good.”

  Ella shook her head. “Your definition of good is quite warped.”

  “Yes, dear, I know that. It always has been. Don’t stop.”

  Ella wanted to laugh. She felt it in the back of her throat, but she stopped herself. She leaned forward and told this stranger what she’d done, like the confessions she imagined Catholics made to the priest on the other side of the partition. Now she knew why they did it—not just for the forgiveness, but for the release.

  “You’re quite a woman,” Mimi said. “You’ve gone and imagined a new life.”

  “No, that’s not it,” Ella said. “I made it up. I can’t believe I did that. And I kept going. Even though I said I’d stop, I didn’t. He leaves tomorrow so…”

  “Well, it sounds fun to me,” Mimi said. “And can’t you see that you’re trying a new story? A different life?” She leaned forward and tapped the table. “Go live that one. I mean, without killing your husband, of course.”

  “He’ll come back to me,” Ella said. “And then—”

  Mimi shook her head. “Trust me on this—you can’t sit around saying ‘and then.’ You can’t wait for someone else to give you permission to chase your life.”

  Ella felt the panic of loneliness well up behind her chest, but she smiled anyway, because that’s what she’d always been taught to do. “You are so sweet to invite me in and let me tell you my crazy story, but I need to get on home. I just wanted to … meet you.”

  “Well, it’s nice to know where the footsteps are coming from.”

  Bruiser started up again. Mimi scrunched her face. She glanced at the dog and then at Ella. “It’s bad, I know. I’m so sorry. I don’t really know what to do about it. I can’t keep medicating him all day long.”

  “It’s okay,” Ella said. “Really. It is.” And she meant it.

  Ella walked to the door and Mimi went with her. They stood side by side as Mimi opened the door. “I’d like it if you came by anytime you want. I really would. I make a mean pound cake and I do like to drink bourbon now and again.”

  “Bourbon and pound cake. Sounds like it could be the cure for everything wrong in my world.”

  “It just might be,” Mimi said before shutting the door.

  five

  Ella had a goal. She wanted to design wedding dresses at Swept Away, the premier wedding boutique in the Low Country. But that seemed a long way off. Ella had been at Swept Away for six months now, hired by the owner, Margo, with the understanding that she would rotate through every department to learn the wedding trade from the ground up. Ella didn’t have any formal training. She was going to take classes at the University of South Carolina satellite campus when the next semester started up. But first she had to pay her dues on the showroom floor. It was an apprenticeship of sorts, and Ella worked hard for the privilege.

  Margo Sands (yes, that was actually her name) opened Swept Away with her daddy’s money. She wanted a hobby, she said. But the joke was on her. The salon had become so successful that her hobby had turned into a real job with real responsibilities. In fact, Margo herself had turned into something of a superstar in the bridal world. She was a tyrant who wore white every day like she was the Tom Wolfe of the wedding world. Small boutiques were popping up in towns across the coast, trying to imitate Swept Away. Margo hated all of them. Actually Margo hated just about everything: gum chewers; cloudy afternoons; tall brides; short bridesmaids; country music. The list was endless and varied. And Ella was sure the list included her. But she so desperately wa
nted to be a designer, she persevered.

  Ella believed that if a woman with a degree in accounting can turn into a wedding dress designer, then so could she. It wasn’t just Ella. Sims, too, had encouraged her. One night, sharing the same pillow, their legs tangled together and her hand on his back, Ella had told Sims about this lost dream of becoming a designer. He’d whispered, “It’s okay, sweetie. I understand. We all need to pursue our dreams. I’ll be fine at the marina.” Of course Sims had encouraged her to follow her passion. He needed her out of the way so he could follow his.

  If pressed, Ella would admit that Margo was a fairly good designer. A natural in fact. The dresses they stocked were mostly from other designers, but when a girl wanted a one-of-a-kind wedding gown she’d imagined her whole life, Margo would help her draw it, before passing it along to their seamstress, LuEllen, to work her magic. Ella had taken her design ideas to Margo more than once. (It was fourteen times, but who was counting?) She would look at Ella and smile, as if at a small child with a broken shell she had picked up on the beach. “That’s sweet,” Margo would say.

  Back to the shoes, back to the shoe department for Ella. Which was where she was today, Thursday. Ella stood in the middle of the shoe department arranging boxes into a pyramid. She wiped off the chairs and arranged the peonies in milky vases on the coffee table. She’d already decided, sometime in the middle of the night, that if Hunter stopped by the store, she would tell him the truth. She would. Definitely.

  Ella wondered what Hunter would think of Swept Away. He might feel it was silly. Men often did. Especially the way that each department had a whimsical name: Tide the Knot for invitations and announcements. Sea-Blush for veils and headpieces. And for the dresses, Tides of Tulle. (Ridiculous, since most of the dresses didn’t even have tulle.) And Sole Mates, where they stocked twenty different styles of shoes, all covered in white satin that could be dyed to bride specification. A chart like the periodic table of elements hung on the wall, and the brides and bridesmaids would stare at it as if they were studying for an exam. Did they want “deep rose” or “ambiance”? “Blush” or “passion”? And was “allure” a half shade lighter than “bashful”?

  Ella had learned a long time ago that bridesmaids don’t like to be told what color shoes they must wear. If a bride wants blush pink, chances are the bridesmaids want siren red rose. If the mother of the bride suggests ocean wave, the maid of honor will counter with marsh green. As if any of it would make a hell of a difference in the end. Today the drama concerned color swatches. The bridesmaids were rebelling.

  This bride—Tilly—had twelve bridesmaids. Twelve! Absurd. Ella didn’t even know twelve women to call for lunch, much less line in pink dresses with shoes to match. Three of them, a trio of blondes, had been sent to finalize everything on a girls’ weekend with Silly. Er, Tilly. They’d spent the last two days in the store, and the nights drinking sugary pink drinks at the Shore Thing Bar two blocks down. This was the third day and they were sunburned, cranky, and hungover. The shoe situation seemed their final straw.

  “Tilly,” one of the blondes called out.

  “What?” she snapped.

  “We hate these shoes,” the other blonde said.

  Margo appeared. Margo always magically appeared at the slightest conflict.

  “Ella, darling,” Margo said as she reached the shoe section in what seemed like a single step.

  “Yes?” Ella smiled at her boss.

  “Which shoes has the bride chosen?” Margo directed her question not to Ella, but to the trio.

  “These.” One of them held up the open-toed strappy shoes with the highest heel in the bunch.

  “Oh!” Margo cooed. It actually sounded like she cooed. “Those are one of my very favorites.” One thing Ella knew about Margo: everything the bride chose was one of her favorites.

  “Of course it is,” the girl said, “because it’s the most expensive. Don’t you have flip-flops or something simple?”

  Ella held her breath. This was the part Margo hated, the part where someone wanted to buy the least expensive thing in the store. Yes, Swept Away did have flip-flops, white with charms that could be attached to the strap.

  Ella jumped in. “Your dresses are so diaphanous and romantic, let’s use something less clunky than flip-flops, something airy, like maybe these?” Ella held out a shoe with a kitten heel and thin white leather straps that wrapped around the ankle.

  “I like those,” the third blonde said. She turned to her friend. “Anna, do you like these?”

  Anna, the tallest blonde, stepped forward. “I do, actually. Much better.”

  Margo raised her eyebrows in approval.

  Tilly let out a little whine. “But you can’t dye those to match the dress,” she said.

  “But you can get jeweled flowers in any color you want and attach them to the straps at the ankle,” Ella said. “A subtle addition without going over the top.”

  “Okay,” Tilly said. “I guess I have to compromise on some things. Right, girls?”

  They groaned, then laughed as one.

  How was this girl ever going to get married? Ella wondered. She was practically sewn together with her friends. Had anyone even mentioned the husband-to-be? This wedding seemed to be all about the girls. It had nothing to do with the man who would be at the end of the aisle. And what did it matter? Ella thought as she went to the backroom to grab the tray of charms. Tilly’s husband would probably cheat on her and Tilly would be alone in some crap apartment over a yapping dog.

  No, not this girl.

  Girls like Tilly didn’t end up in crap apartments. They ended up with a group of friends who took her to Paris to get over her heartbreak while her lawyer made sure she got the house and all the assets.

  Ella couldn’t imagine a happy ending anymore. It was a curse.

  She returned with the charms and held them out for the girls to choose. They played with the flowers until finally Ella pointed to one that was the exact color as the dresses. “This one is called blush, the same as your dresses.”

  “Then that’s it!” Tilly said. One more decision made, one more thing to cross off the list.

  The group wandered into the Tides of Tulle, separated from the rest of the store by a long white curtain. Margo sat on the chaise snuggled in the corner of the shoe section. “Good save there, Ella. Thanks.”

  “No problem.”

  Margo stretched one foot and raised the other to move a box away, but kicked at Ella’s satchel instead. The linen bag fell over, spilling its contents onto the cream throw rug that had to be taken to the cleaners at least once a month. Chapstick, car keys, a stained scrap of paper, two pens, and a cell phone fell out. And what was the one thing Margo picked up? The stained scrap of paper. The one with the drawing of the wedding dress.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize your bag was down there.”

  Ella reached to retrieve her purse’s contents. “No worries.”

  Margo looked down at the sketch and the world slowed, the bridesmaid’s voices sounding like a warped recording, an LP left out in the sun. She squinted at the drawing, picked it up to turn it left and right, even holding it up to the light. “You drew this?”

  “Yes.” Ella held out her hand, reaching for her drawing.

  Margo looked up. “You really did? Like this isn’t from some magazine or Web site?”

  “No. I like to draw … at lunch.”

  “At the café? I see you there almost every day,” Margo said.

  “Really?” Ella hadn’t noticed Margo there, ever.

  “Yes. I’m usually rushing past and I’m jealous of the way you can just sit there enjoying the day, enjoying the sun and being quiet. I’m always in such a rush.”

  “Well, I don’t run a store.” She smiled at Margo and finally dropped her hand.

  “Do you mind if I keep this?” Margo asked.

  “Yes, I kind of do. I mean, I really like it and…”

  “Then can I Xerox it?”r />
  “Why?” Ella bent over to pick up the remaining contents of her satchel.

  “Because it’s beautiful. And who knows? Maybe someday it will come in handy.”

  “Oh. Okay, I guess.”

  Margo stood up and wandered back to the office area where her name was written in shells on driftwood over the door. MARGO SANDS. OWNER. DESIGNER.

  Ella placed the shoes back in the boxes and organized the display area as if Hurricane Tilly hadn’t come through only moments before. She wrote down the orders and put the paperwork in the order box in the backroom. It wasn’t until she arrived home, when Bruiser started barking, and she realized she was out of wine, that Ella remembered the sketch. She dug into her purse just to make sure it wasn’t there. That’s when she saw her phone light up. Hunter.

  Four texts from him—What are you doing tonight? Are you free for dinner?—and her apartment suddenly seemed dingier than usual. It felt old and musty and sad, what with the aggressively peeling paint and slanted floorboards. And empty. The kitchen faucet dripped one small drop every few seconds onto her breakfast dish and coffee mug. She turned on the tap and squirted soap into the sink. She scrubbed the plate and cup and dried them with the single white cotton towel. She did these things while thinking about her kitchen at home. Her pile of blue-striped Turkish dish towels. Her Vietri dishes in the just-right cream pattern. Her dishwasher.

  “Stop!” she told herself. It was enough, pining for all that was lost. She had to take action. Get moving. Do something about it.

  Her phone buzzed. She took three steps to cross the sparse room and pick up her cell. Hunter: text five. Last chance …

  Enough was enough.

  She shouldn’t have started lying to him. Telling him “stories” as her mother had once called lies. If she had just told him the truth, she’d be able to go out with him to dinner right now. It would be better than sitting in her apartment, if nothing else.

  A walk. She would take a walk. That was something.