“Why did you stay away from her?” Dr. Orson asked.
Darcy considered this, crossing her ankles beneath her. She remembered how sour and strange everything had felt, how her mother hadn’t been able to stop crying, how Grandma had handled everything like a champion, unable to let herself break down. She remembered seeing Rachelle for the first time at The Jessabelle House, how she’d wanted to throw her arms around her and sob into her shoulder. But Rachelle had looked like a stranger to her. They’d hugged tepidly, and then they’d stepped away, assessing each other. Darcy had asked about the flight. She hadn’t asked anything about Rachelle’s life in Rome, maybe because she didn’t want to know about anything that was pulling Rachelle away.
“She’s getting married,” Darcy answered instead. “To some Italian guy who none of us have ever met.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“Sort of destroyed,” Darcy admitted. “We used to tell each other everything. I was involved in, like, all of her romantic problems. We gave each other advice about everything. When I started dating my current husband, I remember she got kind of weird about it? I think that might have been part of the reason she went to Italy in the first place.”
Darcy realized that she hadn’t admitted that to herself in a while, although she knew it was true.
They continued talking: about Rachelle and Darcy’s shared history, about the father they hardly spoke to, and about Darcy’s fears for Remy. Eventually, Darcy heard herself say, “I’m worried that it’s already too late for Rachelle and me. Maybe we can never mend our relationship. I don’t think I’m invited to the wedding. I don’t think she’ll ever want to hear from me.”
“Have you considered reaching out to her?”
“Of course!” Darcy said. “But texting her via her social media profile feels so strange. It feels like we’ve never known each other. And I’m terrified she’ll ignore it, anyway.”
Dr. Orson considered this. “What about another way?”
“I don’t have her phone number anymore,” Darcy said. “She changed it.”
“What about a letter?” Dr. Orson suggested. “I know it’s old-fashioned, but I like old-fashioned. It gives you the space and time to think about what you want to say and how you want it to come across. And then, you can slip it into the mail and wait. There’s not as much pressure.”
But Darcy wasn’t sure. “I haven’t written anything by hand in a long time.”
“That might be all the more reason to do it,” Dr. Orson said. “There’s a different connection between the mind and the hand, I think. Maybe it’ll help you tap into your emotional side.”
Their hour was up. Darcy was relieved, as she felt as though Dr. Orson had squeezed her like a sponge. But she thanked her and headed out to her car, wondering if she’d get up the nerve to write Rachelle a letter. She already knew who she could send it to. Diana March’s restaurant had an address listed on her social media channel. She could send it there, and Rachelle would receive it.
But what on earth could Darcy tell her? What could bring Rachelle home?
15
After they left Paris, Estelle and Sam took a train to Lyon, then Marseille. On the trains, they ate croissants and drank wine and talked about the successes of the tour so far. Estelle couldn’t believe how decadent every day was. She couldn’t believe how beautiful the sweeping hills of Avignon were. “France seems like an endless dream,” she said. The bookstores in those exquisite, more southern French towns greeted them warmly, and readers were excited, peppering Estelle with countless questions. All the while, Estelle felt as though she floated in a sort of fantasy, one that had everything to do with traveling abroad—and falling for Albert. She could hardly admit it to herself, but in the darkest hour of every night, there it sat in her heart: her refusal to stop believing in love.
When they reached Madrid, it was more than one hundred degrees. Estelle and Sam sat in the living room of their suite, the air conditioner on full blast. They’d had a very early train ride, and they were conked out.
July was not for the faint of heart.
Luckily, it was too hot for most everyone else in the city, and the manager at the bookstore, who was supposed to featureEstelle tonight, called to say the air-conditioning was out, and they would have to reschedule for the following day. Otherwise, nobody would show up. “Can you stay in Madrid another night?” she asked.
Estelle was pleased to slow down just a little bit. They’d been on the road for weeks at this point, and everything was beginning to blur before their eyes. Sam immediately went to her bedroom to rest, recoup, and catch up on a few things, leaving Estelle to explore for a few hours before stopping in the café's shadow and pulling out her laptop. The server took her wine order—rosé—and then left her to stare at her screen, conscious that something was about to pour out of her.
She wanted to write again. It felt insane. Was she brave enough to put together another story? Could she really do it?
But just as Albert had said, Estelle was a woman in her seventies, like so many other women around the world who’d lost their husbands. An awful fact of science, of life, was that men often didn’t live as long as their wives. The question was: what were their widows meant to do? Were they supposed to spend the rest of their lives locked away, in mourning? Were they meant to reflect forever on days they could never get back?
That didn’t seem like a good life philosophy, Estelle decided. But how could she transcribe it into a book?
Estelle began to experiment with a brand-new protagonist: a woman in her seventies who’d lost her husband, just as Estelle had. But it would have bored Estelle to make her protagonist exactly like her. She gave her a different career; she gave her a very different backstory, a different island to grow up on, and a very different husband.
Rather than dive immediately into the part of the story where her protagonist lost her husband, Estelle decided to start after the loss, during the part when her protagonist was searching for her new identity, her new beginning.
As she typed, the sun dropped lower in the sky and drew Spaniards out of their apartments and into the streets. Finishing for the day, she closed her laptop and watched as the children of the city raced up and down the cobblestones, throwing and kicking balls, and calling out. She knew that European kids—especially in the south—stayed up later than American kids. There was something very funny about seeing a three-year-old waddling around after his older siblings, trying to keep up despite the lateness of the hour.
Sam came out to meet her for a glass of wine and dinner. She looked fresh and well-rested. “What were you up to all day?” she asked, studying the menu.
Estelle didn’t dare tell her daughter she was writing yet. She wasn’t sure what the story was yet. She needed to find the shape of it before she could bring Sam in.
