The Knitting Circle: The uplifting and heartwarming novel you need to read this year. Ann Hood

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СКАЧАТЬ I could only keep her four forever,” Beth said with a sigh.

      Scarlet kneeled in front of Mary. “Do you need help?” she said softly.

      “I, I don’t know what I’m doing here,” Mary said.

      “You just purled two stitches,” Scarlet said, her voice calm and even. “Now you’re going to knit two stitches. Then purl two.” She didn’t move until Mary finally knit two stitches. “Now knit two,” Scarlet said softly. “Now purl two. Now knit.”

      “Come with us for martinis,” Scarlet said as they drove back to Providence.

      Exhausted, Mary said, “Maybe another time. I didn’t even tell my husband I was going out.”

      “See?” Lulu said. “Husbands are a grand liability, Scarlet. They keep you away from martinis.” Lulu pointed out the window. “Look!”

      The moon hung full and orange in the sky ahead.

      “Blue moon,” Lulu said.

      “Looks red to me,” Scarlet said.

      “No, no,” Lulu laughed. “A blue moon is the second full moon in the same month.”

      “Lulu knows more fun facts than anybody I know,” Scarlet said.

      “Correction. More useless facts,” Lulu said, her gaze focused out the window.

      Two hundred and twenty-eight thousand children and young adults die every year. Sixty thousand children a year under the age of six die. Two thousand children a year die from bacterial meningitis. The children who live often lose limbs or hearing or eyesight.

      “You know,” Mary said, her voice quivering, “a martini sounds like a great idea.”

      The bar was downtown, on a block of deserted buildings, tucked away without a sign or awning. Inside, it was crowded and smoky and the three women had to stand crushed close together at the bar.

      Two oversized martinis later, a small table opened and Lulu pushed her way to claim it. Mary was starting to like Lulu. She reminded Mary of her old self, the one who had something to say about everything.

      Sitting with a fresh round of drinks in front of them, Mary said to Lulu, “I can’t believe you ever left the city. It seems like a perfect fit for you.”

      Lulu fished an olive out of her drink and popped it in her mouth. She ordered her martinis dirty, extra olives and their juice.

      Mary frowned, wondering what she had said wrong.

      “Beth can be a bit much,” Scarlet said, breaking the awkward silence. “The matching sweaters. The pictures.”

      “Always with the fucking pictures,” Lulu said.

      Mary’s stomach tumbled, remembering Beth’s voice. What can I say? Stella’s my baby …

      “Mary?” Scarlet was saying, her hand resting tenderly on Mary’s arm. “Are you all right?”

      “I should get home,” Mary managed.

      “Sadie, Sadie, married lady,” Lulu said.

      Later, standing in her bedroom doorway, dizzy and melancholy, Mary studied her husband’s sleeping face. It had become topographical from grief. Even in sleep he wore his sadness plainly. CNN blared from the television, talk of wars and distant tragedies. Mary walked over to the television and turned it off, sending the room into darkness except for the blue moon that lit up the sky.

       PART THREE

       Knit Two Together (K2tog)

      Patterns are more specific about decreasing than increasing. Decreases done in certain ways slant the stitches to the right or left. For many patterns this is an important element; for others it doesn’t matter at all that much. —NANCY J. THOMAS AND ILANA RABINOWITZ, A Passion for Knitting

       5

       Lulu

      On Halloween night, Mary stayed in bed and watched TV. Even as the doorbell rang and children’s voices chirped, “Trick or treat!” to Dylan, Mary stared at the television.

      Downstairs, Dylan marveled at miniature Spider-Men and Harry Potters. He claimed each witch the scariest, each princess the loveliest. Mary did not think of the way that Stella always chose a winged creature for her Halloween costume: butterfly, bumblebee, fairy. She did not think of how meager that list was, how it should have grown over the years, adding bats and ladybugs, raptors and dragonflies.

      Eventually Dylan came upstairs.

      “What a crowd!” he said. “We never have such a crowd.”

      “Usually we’re among them,” Mary said without looking at him. “We’re trick-or-treaters.”

      He stood in front of the television, holding a pastry box tied with string.

      “Someone got mixed up and gave us candy instead of the other way around?” she said, taking it from him.

      She pulled the string from the box and opened it. Inside, nestled in a tight row, sat three cannelles.

      “Scarlet brought them?” Mary said.

      “I found them on the doorstep. No note.”

      Dylan sat beside her on the bed.

      “What a terrible night,” he said.

      Mary handed him one of the pastries and took one for herself, letting its perfect sweetness fill her mouth.

      “It might have been better if we’d done it together,” he said, not looking at her. “If we’d both been down there.”

      Mary shook her head. “I told you I couldn’t,” she said. “You could have hidden up here with me.” She tried not to sound defensive.

      But Dylan said, “I guess I can’t hide from everything like you can,” and she heard that too-familiar edge in his voice.

      “I’m sorry,” Mary told him, though she wasn’t certain what she was sorry about: sorry that Stella had died and she couldn’t handle it? Sorry she couldn’t be more like him in the face of this?

      “I’ll fight you for the third one,” Dylan said, changing the subject, letting their СКАЧАТЬ