Everlasting by Nancy Thayer Read Free Book Online

Putting it back in order had been fun and even satisfying. They had played Little House on the Prairie —since that was what Catherine had been reading that summer—and she insisted she was the mother, Shelly the father, and Ann Laura. By the end of the day they had reclaimed the little playhouse for their own. In a way it was really more their own after they had saved it, cleaned it, and rearranged it to suit their fancies.
    Really, at least she could roll up the ribbons on the spools before they got into an even more hopeless tangle. Catherine reached for the ribbons, which were the colors of sherbets, shining, satiny to the touch. But instantly she stepped on the end of a small branch—apple, she thought—which flipped up and sliced her leg, tearing a run in her hose.
    “All right,” she said to the floor. “We’ll do you first.”
    After a search, she found the broom, dustpan, and trash sacks at the back of the store, next to the card table, which held a hot plate, a pot of water, some crusty jars of instant coffee, sugar, and a jar of fake cream. Little bits of chicken wire were scattered on the floor, with dust, leaves, petals, and paper stuck to it. The wire caught on the edge of the dustpan and refused to slide in without a fight. Catherine swore under her breath, but she was not about to give up yet. She found two perfectly good folding knives hidden in the mess on the floor and a pair of wire cutters under the table.
    Catherine washed off the shelves and tables. She stacked and rearranged things: cardboard boxes and tissue paper, vases and bowls and containers, sheets of foil, ribbons, chicken wire. All the tools, knives and scissors and shears, their edges wiped clean and closed up, together.
    Finished, she looked around at her work, quite satisfied. She felt like a child with a very pretty dollhouse.
    “Oh, my dear! How nice! He’ll be so pleased!”
    Mrs. Vanderveld stepped behind the curtain and clapped her hands like a child.
    “You are just heaven-sent!” she said. To Catherine’s surprise, she grabbed Catherine in a hug.
    Catherine couldn’t remember the last time anyone had hugged her. Well, of course she could, Leslie had hugged her good-bye before she got into the taxi. But that hug had been over almost before it began, it was little more than a flurry of promises and perfume—“Write, take care, I’ll send you postcards from Paris”—before Leslie had hurried into the cab, all her black layers fluttering in her rush.
    This hug was a real embrace. Catherine was surprised at the little woman’s strength. She could feel Mrs. Vanderveld’s plump arms through the gray cloth of her dress. She was so tall and Mrs. Vanderveld so short that the older woman’s head came only to her shoulder. When Mrs. Vanderveld hugged her, a floral scent wafted up from the older woman’s hair and dress and body. For just a few seconds Catherine was enclosed in the smell of summer.
    The phone was ringing. Wanting to please, to show her competence, Catherine rushed to the front to answer it.
    “Vanderveld Flowers,” she said, this time feeling very much in control.
    A woman with an arctic voice wanted to make an order. Catherine scrounged around in the cubbyholes, at last closing her hand on a pen and a blank piece of paper. At first she intended to write down everything the person told her so she wouldn’t lose any information. But the woman on the phone seemed intent on telling her not only what kind of flowers she wanted, but what the occasion was (a dinner party) and where the flowers were to be (on the dining room table, which was twelve feet long, and on the dining room buffet) and what colors she’d prefer (pink, red, white, yellow, purple, but not blue, blue depressed her) and what time she would be home tomorrow to accept delivery of the flowers (four-thirty in the afternoon and not a moment earlier: she had a hairdresser’s appointment).
    “This is an important dinner party. Everything should be