Part Fifty-Six

Peggy gazed up at a sky filled with stars when she stepped out of Raoul's house and waited in the driveway for him to back the car out of the garage.

It was a different routine for both of them. Before moving in with Raoul, Peggy had had a ten minute walk to the ferry, and Raoul had ridden his motorcycle. Now they both rode in his car from his house in the Rolling Bay area of Bainbridge Island. He didn't like driving the car: it was more expensive to take on the ferry, and you had to wait longer to get off the boat. Plus, Peggy knew, he preferred riding his bike whenever he could.

But Raoul didn't complain, and Peggy silently thanked him for that. She once offered to ride with him on the motorcycle; in fact she had tried to insist. But something in her voice must have betrayed her because he rejected the idea saying, 'I can't picture you on the back of a motorcycle at five o'clock in the morning.' He was right: it was not her.

As they rode past the silent, dark forest in the direction of the ferry terminal, Peggy reflected on how easily she had filled the vacant space left in Raoul's house by his late wife. It had been nearly eight years, yet her absence was still noticeable: it looked like the house had another occupant who was away on a trip and would be back soon. In the meantime, Peggy was using her sink, and hanging clothes in her closet, and sitting in her chair at the table, and sleeping on her side of the bed at night. True, Raoul had made a gallant effort to make way for Peggy: he cleared his late wife's bathroom things away from the sink; he moved most, but not all, of her clothes out of the closet. He had left two long dresses that, to Peggy, said volumes about Priscilla. They were fashionable, and sized for a tall, slender woman. Priscilla had been a dancer and actor, and was good at fundraising for charitable causes. Peggy could picture her working a room in these dresses, glamorous and confident. What man with a checkbook would be able to resist?

Peggy was different from Priscilla, and Raoul was different from Peggy's late husband, Taylor. So, they had that much in common: they were each spending serious time with someone completely new. They were each compromising a little bit.

Peggy was shocked to realize that she had been at Raoul's house for almost two weeks, ever since returning from the New Orleans trip on August 31st. She had gone back to her own place a few times to get mail and rotate her clothing so she wasn't wearing the same things all the time. She wondered how long she was going to do this. I haven't exactly moved, she thought. But, on the other hand, I'm in no hurry to go back.

She began to think through the options in her mind as they waited in line and then drove on to the ferry. Did she want to move in with him permanently? Did she want to marry him? Or did she want to go back to her place and just have an indefinite dating relationship? And what about him? What does he want? He may decide that he would rather be alone, she realized.

As so often happened, it was Florence who voiced Peggy's thoughts.

"I can't decide whether or not I prefer to live alone or with someone," said Florence, seemingly out of nowhere. Although, with Florence, every utterance had a purpose, and a target.

"You should live alone," said Paula confidently. Luke looked at her with surprise.

"And why is that?" said Florence.

"Because then you're in control, and you have time for your hobbies," said Paula.

"But I'm in control now and it doesn't make me happy. And besides I don't have any hobbies," said Florence.

"That's where women go wrong, in my opinion," said Paula, who wore a plaid skirt that Peggy had seen before, but this time it was matched with a different vest and dark hose. "They depend on some man to make them happy. Forget it. You have to make yourself happy."

Now Luke looked truly astonished. Peggy had to hide her grin. Maybe Paula was younger and more beautiful than Florence, but at least Florence was traditional and liked men who assumed traditional roles.

"Suppose two people each have their own hobbies and interests," said Peggy. "Then you can have a little bit of both: you do your own things, but at times you do things together."

Paula said, "I haven't met many men my age who want that. They want somebody to take care of the home front while they go off and become successful."

"It's true," said Peggy. "I suppose priorities change at different stages of life. When my children were young I certainly had different priorities than I do now."

"But it's not all as you say," said Florence. "Some of the younger girls in my office can't wait to find a husband and quit working. They would much rather be at home walking the dog and shopping."

"Unfortunately, there are those who give my group a bad name," said Paula.

Meanwhile, Raoul had shared his newspaper with Kelly Flinn and they sat silently absorbed in the pages. Luke, however, was stuck between Florence and Paula and looked like he wanted to disappear behind something, anything.

But then Raoul said, "Florence, you are going to have a hobby. Peggy's going to teach you to make shrimp stew."

"Yes, I meant to tell you that I got this great recipe from the family we visited in New Orleans," said Peggy. "Why don't we learn it together?"

"You don't know what you're getting into," said Florence.

"It'll be fun. You don't mind peeling shrimp, do you?" said Peggy.

"You mean they aren't frozen?"

"Nope. We're starting from scratch."

"Remind me to bring gloves," Florence said.

Raoul closed his paper with an air of things being settled. "In that case, dinner at my house. Everyone's invited."

"But wait," said Peggy. "Let's try not to gang up on the host this time."

Florence cleared her throat. "Peggy, you are the host."

Peggy turned red. It was as if her life had gone off in its own direction without her having willed it. Who's in charge here?