Chapter 2: Perspective

She had done the right thing. She knew that, instinctively, right down to her very bones. And she liked to think she had done it gracefully. But after it was done, Nancy was overwhelmed by how sad and restless she felt. She was between cases and with nothing to set her mental focus on she was lost. In an effort to distract herself she began project after project- she started a charcoal sketch based on a photograph of her beloved little dog, Togo; she drove out to the garden center and spent two backbreaking afternoons digging and mulching and planting rosebushes along the side of the house; she stormed the stronghold of Hannah's kitchen and spent hours learning to make creme brulee. None of it was enough. The gardening wore out her body, but her mind still spun.

On Friday afternoon, about a week after the breakup, Nancy was lying on the couch, reading the first sentence of a novel over and over, when Bess marched in.

"Hi, Nan! We're here," she said unnecessarily, dropping her purse on the coffee table. It thumped heavily. Evidently, Ms. Marvin had come with ammunition. George trailed in behind her, a bottle tucked casually under one arm.

Champagne and chocolate, Nancy realized. It was the girls' traditional post-crisis fare: chocolate for comfort, champagne to celebrate a new season of life. Nancy had raised her glass many times, toasting new beginnings for Bess, George, Callie, Helen- even, one terrible night, for Iola in memoriam-but she had never been on the receiving end before. Nancy sat up and swung her feet to the floor, making room for her friends to sit. Bess claimed the vacant couch space. George sat on the arm of a chair, looking at her expectantly.

"Guys, don't just stare at me," Nancy said.

"I am so sorry I couldn't get over here earlier," Bess said, wrapping Nancy in a soft and vanilla-scented hug. "Everything that could go wrong in my classroom went wrong this week and on top of it all Myra got another ear infection. But we're here for you now. Tell us everything, sweetie."

"We've been texting all week," Nancy said. Bess raised an eyebrow at her.

"Not the same," she said. "Hand me my purse, George. Now, I am going to paint my nails while I am safe from a toddler who wants to help, George is going to open the champagne, and you are going to talk to us." As she spoke she unloaded a bottle of nail polish, a package of tissues, and a large Ziploc bag of her homemade double fudge cookies.

"I'd hate to be one of your kindergarteners. You must have them performing like a drill team," George remarked.

"Don't make me put you in time out!" Bess said. George escaped to the kitchen, laughing.

"I'll be fine, Bess," Nancy said, helping herself to a cookie. "It's a tough adjustment, that's all."

George returned with three glasses and poured out the champagne. "I had a feeling this was coming."

"I didn't want to do it," Nancy said, taking a grateful sip. "I always sort of knew we had different expectations. None of the Nickerson women have ever worked. Ned thought my detective work was exciting when we were younger and he could participate, but I knew he'd want me to give it up soon. I guess- I guess I just hoped if I never looked directly at the truth, it wouldn't be true after all."

"This from the girl who needs to know the stark truth about everything else in the universe," George teased, grabbing a cookie.

"He meant well. He's smart and he's sweet and he saved my life more times than I can count. Girls, please tell me I did the right thing."

"I think you did, sweetie," Bess said, sweeping candy-apple-red varnish languorously across her thumbnail. "Look. I may not be as clever or athletic as either of you, but I understand relationships. Nancy, you had been with Ned since high school, and that's a lot of time to invest with a person. You probably don't know who you are without him. But who you were with him would never have been everything Nancy Drew was meant to be. You made the right choice."

Nancy grabbed for a tissue. "It would be so much easier if he were still away at college or something. He works with my dad, of all people. I can't get any distance."

"Maybe you should get out of town for awhile," George suggested.

"Maybe," Nancy said. She reached for her champagne and lifted the glass. "To the future, I guess."

"To the future," her friends echoed.

Despite her friends' support and encouragement, she still felt off-kilter. River Heights didn't feel like home anymore and she couldn't tell whether she or the town were at fault. Probably a little of each, she thought, and she decided that as long as she was feeling unmoored she would take George's advice and run with the current for awhile. So Nancy packed a suitcase and went out, with mixed fear and exhilaration, to do all the things she had been thinking about doing "someday." She went to Greenland first, then to Europe. She worked on an archaeological dig and on a fishing boat. She attended an opera in London, skated on a canal in the Netherlands, and posed for a young artist in Rome. She had a brief and regrettable rebound fling with a touring Russian violinist. And in the end she came home to River Heights, sated with her adventures and ready to return to work.

"Did you get it out of your system?" Ned asked, having run into her at the grocery store.
"That's a rude thing to say," Nancy said, and resumed picking through the apple bin for an unbruised dozen.

"A fishing boat, Nancy?" Bess asked, a sour look on her face.
"Haven't you ever wanted to try really hard manual labor?" Nancy asked, smiling at her fastidious friend. Bess shook her smooth blonde curls.
"I love you, but I don't understand you sometimes," she said.

Only George understood-energetic, fearless George, who was living her own adventure now by teaching martial arts at her own small studio. "I'm glad you went," she said when she picked Nancy up at the airport. Nancy laughed.

"The customary phrase is 'welcome home,' George," she said merrily.

George tossed Nancy's small suitcase into her trunk. "Are you glad to be back?"

"Yes. I really am."

"Well, then, welcome home. We missed you."

"I missed me, a little," Nancy said, and George shot her a glance which said she understood.

"Ready to pick up the old magnifying glass again?"

"Oh, yes," Nancy said fervently. "Please tell me the town is seething with suspicious activity."

"Rogues and thieves coming out of the woodwork. Chief McGinnis was spotted weeping into his coffee at the diner yesterday. Other customers say they heard him sobbing something about not being able to cope with the crime wave sweeping the country since the Drew girl went on vacation."

"George!" Nancy swatted her friend's arm.

"Sorry, Nan. It's been strictly 'O little town of River Heights, how still we see thee lie.'"

"Something will turn up," Nancy said, settling into her seat to watch the familiar scenery go by.