Danielle Steel - 44 Charles Street

Francesca was in the living room at exactly six-thirty in a black cocktail dress that looked demure enough, with heels that were too high, and an evening bag that was too jazzy, with rhinestones on it, a gift from her mother from Paris. She wore her hair in a bun, which seemed right. His mother wore a plain black dress with a high neck and long sleeves, and her regulation pearls that she wore with everything, and that Francesca suspected she probably slept in. The fantasy of their two mothers together nearly made her choke.

“How did you and Chris meet?” his mother asked her over cocktails. Francesca had no idea what to say to her. He was living in my house didn’t sound like the right answer. I’m his landlady… I run a boarding house… In church? There was no right answer. Chris had warned her not to say she lived at 44 Charles with him.

“We met through friends.” Chris had been listening, and wandered by to fill in. Francesca smiled silent thanks. She was constantly afraid to do or say the wrong thing.

Chris’s father asked what kind of work her father did, and she said he was an artist. She mentioned his name, and they were impressed by that, which was a relief. And she mentioned that her mother was in Gstaad for Christmas. They looked a little shocked by that. Her father being in Sun Valley was okay. They knew it and liked it. But a ski resort in Europe sounded like Sodom and Gomorrah to his mother.

“The only way to get through these dinners is to get blind drunk and keep smiling,” one of his cousins told her in a whisper as they headed to dinner, and she laughed. The suggestion had a lot of appeal, but she wouldn’t have dared do it. You had to be alert to field their questions. They wanted to know where she’d grown up, where she’d gone to school, whether she went to boarding school, whether she’d ever been married, and of course she didn’t have children, and where did she spend her summers? Maine was good. Running an art gallery was questionable, but since her father was an artist, it was forgivable. His sister and brother spoke to her from time to time. She felt like she’d been playing tennis all night by the time they finished dinner, and she collapsed in her room for a minute, before they went to church again. They were so much more impressive than she had expected, and being face to face with them was even dicier than she had imagined. Particularly his mother. The thought of his mother in the same room with hers made her feel faint. It was a frightening prospect that meant that if she ever married him, they’d have to elope. There would have been no way to have her family and his under one roof, let alone at a wedding. Only Avery would have passed muster. Her father was much too racy and unconventional too. He hadn’t gone to Harvard, he hated sports, and knew nothing about football. And introducing her mother to this very proper conservative group was out of the question. They were as white-bread, pure, holy, church-going, and athletic as it got. And they were successful, social, and important on top of it. There didn’t seem to be one rebel in the group, except Chris, who was a renegade by their standards and no one else’s.

Chris burst out laughing when he saw her sprawled out on her bed before church, looking like she’d run a marathon, and exhausted. She had ten potential outfits spread out on her bed for upcoming events.

“Having fun yet?” he teased her. “Don’t mind my mother. She’s a little like Scylla and Charybdis, or whoever they have posted at the gates of Hell these days, but when you get past her and she gives you her seal of approval, you can pretty much do what you want. All you have to do is show up for meals on time and not do anything to seriously annoy her.”

“She’s your mother. I don’t want to offend her.” Francesca couldn’t remotely imagine ever getting his mother’s approval.

“It’s rude to ask people that many questions. She should be worried about offending you. Start asking her stuff, like where she went to school. She loves that. She went to Vassar when it was an all-girl school. She’s very proud of it.” It was an easy entree to a benign conversation with her.

“I’ve never been to church twice in one day in my life,” Francesca said with a look of desperation. “If God sees me there, He’ll throw me out, and the whole congregation will be hit by lightning.” He laughed, grateful for her patience.

“It’s good for you. Brownie points in Heaven,” he said, as he pulled her off the bed. “Speaking of which, I’m sorry to do this to you, but it’s time to leave for church.” There were twenty of them going to midnight mass. Francesca couldn’t remember their names or who they were, except his siblings, with whom she had nothing in common. They were just Harleys to her, en masse. The only one who stood out to her was Chris. She was almost angry at him for bringing her here, but staying home alone in New York would have been depressing too, and she loved him. So here she was, on her way to church again, for the second time that day. Her father would have laughed, and even her mother would have been amused. Thalia hadn’t even gone to church for her last three weddings.

Francesca dozed off in church during the homily. And afterward they all went back to the house, and then mercifully everyone went to bed. The vice patrol in the form of his mother said goodnight and went to her room after wishing everyone a merry Christmas, with the emphasis on the “Christmas,” not the “merry.” Francesca noticed that no one kissed, and fathers and sons shook hands. There were no bear hugs in this group.

Chris was in Francesca’s room half an hour later. She was thirty-five years old, and she felt fourteen and like a juvenile delinquent. She was afraid to wind up in juvenile hall, or detention, or jail.

“Merry Christmas, baby,” he said as he kissed her then, and he handed her a box he had carried in his jacket. It was a long slim box from Tiffany’s, and when she opened it, she saw that it was a gold bracelet with hearts on it. He put it on her arm and kissed her. She had bought a gray cashmere scarf for him, and he loved it too.

She was relieved that she only had two more days to get through. But the next day was better because it was Christmas. They had present opening, a big meal, with the table set for thirty, with the children at the table in the hall again, the girls in velvet dresses. There was touch football outside afterward on the frozen ground, from which she was exempt because she was a girl. And then they all drank hot toddies and sat around the fire. Chris’s mother played bridge with her husband, her daughter, and one of her nieces. And Chris sat next to the fire with her. Ian was playing upstairs somewhere with the other kids. And by midnight she was back in her room with Chris. Only one more day to go, and then they could leave. She could hardly wait.

“Are you having fun?”

“Yes,” she lied, “but I’m scared all the time that I’m going to do the wrong thing. I feel like a kid.” That part was the truth.

“You just have to ignore them. They think they created the world, but they didn’t. That’s why I only come home twice a year. And it’s better at the Vineyard. It’s more relaxed.” He was well aware that his family could drive most people insane. They were major overachievers in everything they did, and expected everyone else to be too, and conform to all of their rules. He hadn’t in years, but no longer confronted them about it. He just led his own life, he always had. But he liked coming home for Christmas, for all the traditions, and was grateful she had come with him. He knew this wasn’t easy for her, to be constantly scrutinized. He readily admitted to her that his family lived in a cookie-cutter world, where everyone was the same and all the pieces fit. She came from a world where nothing fit, neither her mother nor her father. One was outrageous and the other was artistic and eccentric. But both she and Chris were their own people, independent of their parents’ ideas and lives.

“Your mother would have a stroke if she ever met my parents,” Francesca said ruefully.

“Yes, she would,” he agreed. “But, so what? I don’t approve of my parents either. They live an incredibly limited life and they bore me to tears.” At least he agreed with her about it, but she didn’t want to be rude about his family. They were decent, respectable people. She just felt ill at ease and off-kilter in their midst. She didn’t fit. But neither did Chris. She was comforted by that.

He slept in her bed again that night, and was gone before seven, and he had breakfast with his mother again. It was the day after Christmas, so everyone was more relaxed, even his mother. And for once, they didn’t have to go to church. Everyone played tennis and squash again, which seemed to be a daily ritual when they all got together. Francesca still couldn’t remember anyone’s name, and she felt like she had dementia. She was the only “Francesca” in the group. The men all seemed to be named Chris, Bob, or William, and there were at least five of them with each name. The women were Elizabeth, Helen, and Brooke. His mother was Elizabeth with countless offspring of all ages named after her.

The only one who seemed to be having any fun was Ian, who loved his cousins and was unhappy to leave. Chris had a last breakfast with his mother on the day they left. His father drove them to the airport and said he had loved meeting Francesca, and she felt like she had been in the twilight zone for three days. It had been the weirdest Christmas of her life, and in spite of that, she still loved him, but she couldn’t wait to get back to New York and relax. She wanted to scream with joy the minute they got back to the house. They had been there for ten minutes when her mother called her from Gstaad.

“I hope you had a nice Christmas,” she said blithely. “I met the most divine man at dinner on Christmas Eve. He lives in New York, he’s Swiss, he’s a banker, and he’s taking me to dinner as soon as I get back.” Francesca could tell her mother was beaming, and she almost groaned. It sounded like number six was on the way at last. Wait till the Harleys heard about that.

“Don’t rush into anything,” Francesca said wanly. There was no stopping her mother when she had a potential husband in her sights. And she hadn’t had one in too long, according to her. And it wasn’t for lack of trying.

“Of course not. It’s just dinner, for heaven’s sake, not marriage.”

“That’s refreshing,” Francesca said, and her mother laughed.

“You don’t trust me, do you?”

“No, I don’t. I figure you’re going to find number six one of these days.”

“What’s so wrong with that, if it makes me happy?” her mother asked her, and for a long moment Francesca didn’t answer as she thought about it.

“You know, you’re right. At this point, it doesn’t make much difference. Five, six, and if you’re happy, to hell with what everyone else thinks.” She had just spent three days with the most conservative, boring people on the planet, and they were a lot more obnoxious than her mother. At least her mother had some style and spirit. “Go for it, Mom,” she said, laughing. “Do what makes you happy. But if you throw me the bouquet at your next wedding, I’ll kill you.”

“All right, dear. See you when I get back. I may stop in Paris first.” When Francesca hung up, Chris was looking at her. He was grateful she had gone to Boston with him and been a good sport. His parents even said they liked her.

“My mother is crazy,” she told him matter-of-factly. “But I think I just figured out that I like her that way.” It was a whole new way of looking at things, and she realized that it probably meant she had grown up and accepted her mother for who she was. It was a first for Francesca.

They went upstairs to bed that night, and Francesca had never been happier to be in her own bed, with Chris lying next to her. She didn’t have to answer anyone’s questions. He didn’t have to leap out of bed and run down the hall to his own room before seven, and she didn’t have to satisfy anyone’s assessment of what she should look like, wear, or say. She was her own person even if she didn’t fit in. She fit in here in her own house and world. And she was totally happy in her own little universe with Chris next to her in his boxers and T-shirt, and Ian sound asleep downstairs. And it was a very nice little life they shared.

AT THE LAST minute, with nothing else to do, Chris and Francesca decided to go back to Vermont with Ian for the New Year’s weekend and use Marya’s house there. They had no babysitter for Ian now with Marya gone, and they were happy to have him with them for a family weekend.

They liked being together, and the revelry in the city didn’t appeal to either of them. He had been invited to a few parties, and so had she. But being in Vermont seemed like a nicer way to spend it, so they drove to Vermont the day before New Year’s Eve.