"Okay, okay. I have about a thousand other reasons I'm not ready to retire yet. How do you want them? Alphabetically or in descending order?"
"Seriously, George Jetson? What could be so bad about getting off Astro's treadmill?" Gillian looked around for a blanket to throw over her legs. Not seeing one, she tucked her legs up under her bum instead.
"Nicola started talking about retiring four years ago. We agreed to revisit it when Flora graduates. Since Flora now has a nice inheritance from Ginika, she doesn't need our assistance with grad school so I haven't that excuse like I did when she went to university."
Feeling loose from every one of her glasses of wine, Gillian pressed on and asked a question she never would have done had Nicola been there. "Would you feel different if it were Kate pressuring you to retire?"
"Why? Why do you ask that," came the fast reply as the question instantly sobered up the blonde.
"I wonder if you think about her the way I sometimes do about Robbie. I would love to not be retiring alone. I worry a little about being lonely. Not sure where to find good men at my age," she admitted before nervously pushing her hair out of her eyes, worried about Caroline's reaction.
"That's it. I'm cutting you off," Caroline said as she moved the wine bottle out of Gillian's reach. "You've never had trouble finding men, but a good man? That could prove difficult; they might be like unicorns and don't really exist." Realizing that sounded a little harsh, she tried to lighten her remarks, "You could always open a bait shop in Scotland; bet you'd meet plenty of blokes that way."
"Wow. Evading the original question," Gillian retorted, knowing full well the bottle would be empty before they retired for the night. "Interesting."
"Gillian," she said as she tried to level her with a stern look that failed as the former headmistress was massively out of practice. Her job at the Foundation required her to smile more than any other she had in academia and it was part of what she liked about it. "Of course not. I decided a long time ago not to look back as I'm not going in that direction. I can't." Caroline was curt as she was trying to stave off any further conversation about Kate; it was a dangerous subject when she was this many drinks in.
"I could say that's another evasion but I'll let it pass." They fell silent for a bit as their drinks took hold once again and softened out the edges a bit. Eventually Gillian asked another pointed question. "It's your 20th anniversary this year, isn't it? How's it feel to be with someone that long? That's longer than you were with John and Kate put together."
"Longer. You forget we were together a couple of years before we married," Caroline flashed Gillian an inscrutable look trying to understand where the conversation was meant to go or if Gillian was just trying to fill the silence. The farmer never did silence well when she'd been drinking. "It took a long time for the ghost of what I had with Kate to fade but now I can't imagine my life without Nicola all these years since I couldn't have Kate."
"I'm glad you didn't shrivel up after she died. We were all worried about you."
"I couldn't. I had Flora and the boys. I had to get on with it." Flora's cat, Whiskers, jumped up onto her lap and settled in as soon as Caroline rubbed the top of her head. The cat started purring and shut her eyes tight with happiness.
For a change, Gillian sat silently watching Caroline, which prompted her to continue. "Watching Flora about to launch reminds me how I knew where I wanted my life to take me when I finally had my PhD and how excited I was to begin it. As soon as I got where I wanted to be with each position, I was always looking for the next challenge. Can I really be at the end of all that just as she's starting?" She was hoping Gillian wouldn't get the subtext that she was a little jealous of her daughter. During this time with Nicola away, she'd spent a fair amount of time reflecting about what she'd have done differently if given a do-over.
Assuming it was a rhetorical question, Gillian let it hit the floor and instead responded, "The problem with always looking for the what's next is that you never allow yourself to enjoy the 'what is'." She could see the earnest fear in Caroline's eyes so she continued to verbalize her thoughts, "It seems to me that what you have is a struggle between striving versus allowing."
When Caroline didn't readily respond, Gillian gave her a self-satisfied smile that wasn't lost on her. "That's deep for someone who is as many glasses of wine in as you. There's more I still want to do with this job."
Without missing a beat, Gillian replied, "You're a tool, that's what you are. There will always be more to do and good people to do it. You've got a wife who actually wants to spend time with you. What are you waiting for? Do you want them to carry you out of your office feet first?" Caroline winced as her words from earlier in the night came back to haunt her and instantly reminded her about Beverley.
Only two months prior she received a call from Angela about the unexpected passing of Beverley's husband, Larry. Angela had kept in touch with Beverley, even after Madeline's passing. Larry was all set to retire and they booked a trip to celebrate. Two weeks before Larry's scheduled last day at work, he complained about having indigestion after dinner. Beverley gave him an antacid and didn't think anything of it when he went to bed a little earlier than usual that night. A few hours later, she found him; he laid down in bed and died of a heart attack.
Thinking Caroline's fears were really just about what it would be like to not have her position at the Foundation, Gillian tried to reassure her further. "But you took that leap to London with Nicola and look how that's worked out. This is just another leap and one that's best taken together."
"Well, I also worry that if we stop working and spend all our time together she'll see how old and boring I'm becoming. John used to tell me how boring I was. Kate figured that out and left me at one point before…" her voice trailed off as her candor surprised even herself.
"None of us are getting younger, not even Nicola, and you couldn't be boring if you tried. Don't you realize that after two decades it's still you that Nicola can't wait to come home to? Besides, look at me. It's my first escape from the farm in ages and I came to see you."
"Ha! She can still chase a tennis ball but my knees and hips forced me to give up the game last year. I fear a replacement of something is in my future if I'm to keep up with her." She shifted a bit which caused the cat to jump down off her lap. Whiskers sauntered over to the coffee table and rubbed back and forth against one of its legs before jumping back up onto the sofa.
"Those replacements are nothing anymore, certainly not a sign you're growing old, just that you've lived more of your life in those damned heels than the rest of us mere mortals." Gillian unfolded her legs and stretched them out in front of her and put her feet up onto the coffee table as the cat crawled onto her lap this time.
Caroline laughed at Gillian's remark. She took a long, fortifying sip and then continued to press on about how old she was becoming to get Gillian to understand her fear was real. "I've got more age spots than Nicola. They seem to multiply overnight. Oh, and apparently I have the start of cataracts."
"Those don't mean anything either. They've been watching Ellie's for more than four years now and she's about to have the first one removed next month; they can happen at any age. My guess is that you haven't shared any of these concerns with your better, and allegedly younger looking, half yet. What's really going on?"
Realizing Gillian knew her too well, Caroline opened up even further. "When we first got together, she was fabulous with Flora. If I'm honest, part of me always wondered if Flora wasn't really the basis of her attraction to me. She told me herself she missed Pat's boys more than Pat after they split."
"You've got to be kidding?!" Gillian was almost at a loss for words. She lazily stroked the cat with her free hand, not willing to set down her glass to use both hands to help the cat settle in.
"Hmmm. Nope. I'll even admit that's why I didn't want to retire when Flora left for Cambridge. I was convinced that once the nest was empty Nicola would realize we'd run out of things to talk about if we didn't at least have Unilever in common."
"As I live and breath," Gillian started incredulously. "Caroline, the practically perfect in every way daughter of Celia, had those kinds of self doubts? You really are a tool. There's no way Nicola would have ever been that shallow. You know she's loved you since your school days. She makes a point of telling everyone how if times were different you would have been her sweetheart back then, just like me dad and your mum would have been had it not been for me mum."
"Pathetic, isn't it? Don't tell anyone I was a little jealous of her connection with Flora," Caroline asked. She picked up the bottle and poured the last of the wine into their glasses in an effort to avoid eye contact. In those dark days feeling sorry for herself after Kate died she assumed that at her age she would never find a mate who would embrace her child.
"Besides, Pat cheated on her. Why would she miss her? And you two have built the loveliest of homes and it's clearly one that's been built on love."
"Over the years I've realized that it's gratitude that makes a house a home. I was so grateful for Kate and for the life we were building. I lost that feeling of gratitude for a bit after…when I was really struggling as a single parent. But I got it back with Nicola and I know how lucky I was to find it again."
"That might just be a bit too deep for me after all this wine. I thought you'd tell me the sex made it worth staying for the past 20 years," Gillian admitted in an effort to lighten the conversation.
"Don't knock it till you've tried it," Caroline quipped. It was all Gillian ever got out of her on the subject, even when they were in their cups.
Sensing Caroline was getting lost in her thoughts again, Gillian pulled her back into their conversation. "Admit it. When the nest was empty you found there were still lovebirds living in it, didn't you?"
Caroline laughed in spite of herself and gave Gillian a coy smile over the top of her wine glass. "It was really the first extended time alone we'd had in all our years. Sure Greg would take Flora in the summers for a week or two but this was different. We missed Flora but the freedom was wonderful."
"But retirement is nothing more than the ultimate freedom, isn't it? From what I've seen, you've never failed at anything. I'll bet retirement will be just one more thing you'll both succeed at, despite your fears." Gillian drained the last of her wine and leaned forward to set the glass down by the empty bottle. Whiskers moved back to Caroline as soon as Gillian moved, but after walking across her legs, jumped down to the floor and went in search of something only she knew.
Caroline, used to being left behind by the cat, looked at the clock on the mantle and then over at Gillian who was quietly gazing out the picture window at the snow that could be seen falling in the glow of the lamp post. Caroline followed her eyes to peer out the window and realized the silent snowfall had begun and it filled her with the same sense of wonder as it did when she was a young girl. She thought for a moment about her young daughter and how she really had nothing to be jealous of Flora about, and her heart swelled with pride at all Flora planned to do with her life.
Looking down at the almost empty glass in her hand, she raised it to her lips and drained it as she suddenly knew what she needed to do. Perhaps it was the wine, or perhaps it was the relief from having finally said her biggest fears out loud. Whatever it was, Caroline found she was feeling better than she had since Nicola left for the States. She was still sober enough to know it wasn't just the wine that made her forget some of her aches and pains. For all her impulsiveness and rash talk, sometimes Gillian could really hit the mark when she needed her to do so.
"I'm glad you're here, Gillian. When we're all retired we'll have to make it a point to see more of each other."