The Invisibles by Cecilia Galante

Author:Cecilia Galante
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-05-28T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

A light wind whipped the hair along the top of her head and rustled the leaves in the trees, but the silence that descended as she moved through the streets was so still as to feel almost sacred. It was the sort of stillness that had draped itself over her that last terrible night, after everything was over, as if the world around her had stopped breathing. She broke down all at once as she felt it and leaned against the thick trunk of an oak to steady herself. There was no telling how far she’d walked or even where she was exactly, but she was not worried. She longed for Alice Walker, her silent, faithful companion, who had only to push her nose into the space between Nora’s ear and shoulder for her to feel that everything off balance had once again aligned itself. She felt an ache now, thinking of it, and sat down against the tree. For a long time, she sat very still, her eyes closed against the world, and breathed in and out.

Her watch said 12:45 a.m. God, was it that late already? She had to get back. She winced, thinking of it. The women would still be up, waiting for her, probably sitting in a row on the couch, hands on their knees, rushing fearfully toward the door when she came in. Even if they didn’t push her to talk, the strain in their faces would be evident; they would have already discussed the situation in her absence, weighed in on her mental state (and here Grace was supposed to be the one with problems!), maybe even devised some other kind of secret hand signal or eye movement the way they used to do at Turning Winds whenever one of them needed to talk.

No. There was not a single person in the world who needed to treat her with kid gloves. She was beyond this. Past it. The fact of the matter was that Grace had a baby now, a real, living, breathing child. That was just the way things were. She needed to be stronger, to steel herself when the child inevitably cried. Because that was just what babies did; they cried. They wailed too, when their needs were not being met fast enough. And if her reaction to hearing it brought her to her knees, she would let herself fall, but only on the inside. This would be the last time she crumbled in front of them. In front of anyone. She was an adult now, thirty-two years old, for God’s sake. It was time to act like one. She got up quickly, pushing herself off the trunk, and headed back to the house.

Breakfast the next morning was a somewhat somber affair, although Ozzie tried her best to keep things light with her goofy jokes, and Henry served perfectly poached eggs atop English muffins, each one dolloped with a lemony hollandaise sauce. There were individual mixed berry compotes too, and good, strong coffee, all served out on the back deck again as the sun peeked through the blinds.

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