What did she expect her to say? Or do? Lydia had been managing on her own for six months. She didn’t have the energy for help. She didn’t want to make a... A chore list for Ruby so that Ruby could feel helpful.
It had been a relief when people had stopped doing that. She’d been inundated in the first weeks after Mac died. Phone calls and messages and offers of food. It had been nice, but it had been...
A lot.
“I got a job also,” Ruby said, looking down into her tea. “But shouldn’t I want to be here for you? You were all...you were all there for me. You found me.”
And onto the obligation was heaped guilt.
Lydia sighed. “Ruby, I am glad to have you back.”
How the hell had she ended up managing Ruby’s feelings?
“If you need help with the kids or with...with farm chores.”
Lydia laughed. “I do not want your help with farm chores. That’s like asking a cow for help with knitting.”
Ruby wrinkled her nose. “Are cows helpful with knitting?”
“No, Ruby, they don’t have thumbs. And you don’t know how to do manual labor.”
“I just...don’t want you to be sad.”
“Well. I’m sad,” Lydia said. “And I’m going to be for...” Maybe forever. This terrible sadness she had no name for. “A while. So don’t make it your mission, please. You will end up thwarted.”
“God knows none of us needs to have a thwarted Ruby roaming around,” Marianne said.
“What would that even look like?” Dahlia asked.
“Hey!” Now Ruby was looking wounded.
“Tell us more about your wild adventures,” Marianne said, lifting her teacup to her lips, smiling.
“Wild adventures?” Lydia asked.
“I have it on Ruby’s authority that there were Italian men,” Marianne said.
That broke something in Lydia’s vision. Cracked the glass she looked at her sister through. Because of course Ruby wasn’t a baby, any more than Dahlia was, but she had a difficult time seeing either of them as fully grown women. And the thought of Ruby fooling around with European men was a strange one indeed.
Still she was very happy for the subject change, and if putting Ruby in the hot seat eased the gravity of the moment...
She supposed that made Ruby helpful. Just in unexpected ways.
“Just two,” Ruby said, sounding defensive.
“And a Frenchman.”
“Justthe one,” Ruby said dryly.
“Any Englishmen?” Lydia asked. “You were always a big one for Mr. Darcy.”
“I am not a sex tourist,” Ruby said crisply. “Though, yes.”
“And again, you came back home why?” Marianne asked.
“Because they weren’tmyMr. Darcy. None of them were more than a paragraph of my story.”
It was a strange choice of words. They weren’t more than a paragraph of her story. And it pushed Lydia off-kilter even more.