Follow the Stars Home. Luanne Rice

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      “Take her,” Dianne begged.

      “Your daughter is hungry,” Alan said. He led Dianne almost roughly to the rocking chair by the window and pushed her down. Then, in the tenderest gesture Lucinda had ever seen, he opened the front of Dianne’s robe. She had been fighting, but now she stopped. She just sat there, unable to move.

      Alan placed Julia at Dianne’s breast. Tears rolling down Dianne’s cheeks, she sat there in the dim light, refusing to look at her child. Outside, galaxies blazed in the night. She stared up, as if she wanted to leave this torment and become the blue star in Orion’s belt. Stubborn, she wouldn’t embrace her daughter. Kneeling before her, Alan supported Julia while she nursed at Dianne’s breast.

      A long time passed. Minutes seemed like an hour. After a while, Dianne held her child. Her arms moved up from her sides, seemingly of their own accord. Taking hold of Julia, she touched arms with Alan. Lucinda watched their foreheads nearly brushing, looking down at the baby. Their faces were together, their arms were entwined. Julia sucked hungrily.

      Lucinda stood at the stove, remembering. Glancing at the table, she could almost see them now: Dianne, Alan, and Julia.

      Lucinda decanted the soup into a big container, leaving the lid off to let it cool a little. She packed some fresh bread and butter into a bag, poured some lemonade into a jar. Then, heading across the side yard, she went to tell her daughter that the doctor was sick and it was her turn to make a house call. There were times, she swore, that Dianne was blind to her own life.

      At first Dianne felt impatient. Building a widow’s walk to sit atop her newest playhouse, modeled after one she admired in Stonington, was taking all her concentration. But her mother was insistent, telling her she’d made some chicken soup for Alan, and that Dianne had to drive it over to him.

      “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve been to his house?” she asked.

      “Well,” her mother said dryly. “You have his address in your book. Look his street up in the gazetteer if you’ve forgotten where he lives.”

      “Only a librarian would have a gazetteer,” Dianne said.

      “Librarians aren’t so different from carpenters,” she said. “The right tool for each job.”

      “I know where he lives,” Dianne said reluctantly.

      “Julia is so lucky,” Amy said.

      They both turned to look at her. She had brought over a game of checkers, and she was playing a brand-new version with Julia.

      “To have Dr. McIntosh for an uncle,” Amy explained.

      “It has its ups and downs,” Dianne said.

      “That’s terrible, Dianne,” Lucinda said. “He’s very good to you both.”

      “Mom, I have to finish this order by Sunday,” Dianne said, trying again. “Can’t you take it over?”

      “I have the girls coming over for reading group tonight, and I have to get things ready.”

      “And you found time to make him soup?”

      “Like Amy said. He’s Julia’s uncle,” Lucinda Robbins said.

      Dianne had the truck windows open, letting spring air blow through the cab. The birds were in high gear, making the twilight hour zing with feeling. Swallows caught bugs in the fields. Flocks of starlings swooped and swirled in one black cloud. A lone kingfisher sat on the telephone wire above Silver Creek. Dianne smelled rose gardens, fresh earth, and the salt flats. Her mother’s package was in back, nestled among weighty bags of hinges and twopenny nails.

      Pearl Street was smack in the middle of Hawthorne. One of the oldest streets in town, many prosperous whaling captains and merchants had built their houses there in the 1800s. Two blocks back from the harbor, it was a little quieter than Front and Water streets.

      Driving slowly down Pearl Street, Dianne breathed the salt air. The sun was setting, and the white facades glowed with peachy iridescence. She hadn’t visited Alan at home in many years. His street brought back old memories of being happy with Tim, and she drove a little faster.

      Alan’s house was a Victorian. White clapboards, gray trim, three steps leading up to a wide porch. Gingerbread, dovecote, a grape arbor. But the place was in disrepair. Paint peeling, one shutter on a side window missing, the weather vane cockeyed. The grass needed cutting, and the day-sailor on its rusty trailer had not seen saltwater in a long time. She remembered long sails with her husband and brother-in-law.

      Their relationship had been smooth back then. She had sensed that Alan wanted the best for her and Tim. He would invite them sailing, and they would invite him to dinner. Everyone was on his, and her, best behavior. Those sailing days were bright and sparkling, the three of them on Alan’s small sloop. He’d be at the tiller, Tim stretched out with a cap over his eyes, Dianne manning the jib as they sailed the Sound.

      One brilliant sunny day, the waves splashing over the rail, Dianne had felt incredible joy. They were sailing to windward, Tim trawling for bluefish off the stern, Dianne crouched in the bow. She had turned, mouth open in sheer delight, to say something about the sun or the wind or the three of them being together, and she caught Alan looking at her. His eyes were narrowed, the expression full of regret and longing. In that one glance she knew that his mood had to do with what had once briefly been between them, and for that instant she felt it too. She turned quickly away.

      Dianne and Alan kept things polite and superficial. They were each other’s in-laws. She would make fish stew every Friday night, and Alan would come over for dinner between office hours and hospital rounds. He would ask her opinion on what color carpeting he should get for his office. Tim would grin, holding Dianne’s hand, glad to include Alan in their happy family life. But the pretense between Dianne and Alan collapsed the day Tim took to the sea for good.

      Crossing the unkempt lawn, she spied something in the grass: an old birdhouse. Dianne had made it for Alan many years earlier, before she had had Julia. As a promise to Alan’s future kids, that she would build them the greatest playhouse in Hawthorne, Dianne had made him the birdhouse. She remembered Tim holding the ladder while Alan climbed up to hang the house in the tall maple. Now it had fallen down. Propping it against the stone foundation, Dianne walked up the front steps.

      Dianne rang the doorbell again and again, but no one came to the door.

      “Hello,” she called. “Hello!”

      It felt strange to be standing there. She remembered the night she and Tim had come to tell Alan their amazing news: that she was three months pregnant. She had stood in the foyer with Tim’s arms around her as Tim invited Alan to touch her belly. She had felt embarrassed for Alan; she could see the discomfort when he met her eyes, but he’d done what Tim asked to please his brother. His touch had been sure and steady. Closing her eyes, Dianne felt Alan connecting with the baby inside her, and she’d shivered.

      “Alan,” she called now. “Are you home?”

      She tried the doorknob. It turned. Creaking open, the heavy door led into a small entry hall and living room. The decor could be considered minimal: one mahogany table, one rolltop desk with chair, and one bleached-cotton covered love seat. His decorating skills hadn’t improved.

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