“—we just want you to choose someone who is better suited for you. Someone who is settled, has a good job and—”
“Plays golf?”
“Well, that’s not a requirement, of course,” her father said, pushing his glasses up his nose and crossing his arms. “We feel this younger man with such a colorful background might not be the best choice. We do have Blakely to think about.”
“And the Theriot family name,” Eleanor said.
“Now you’re making sense, Eleanor,” Margaret said, a pleased light emerging in her cold eyes. “I know you miss Skeeter. We all do. Porter and I don’t expect you to mourn him forever, but we do expect you to have some standards.”
Hot anger flooded Eleanor, and the kernel of dislike she’d hidden for many, many years exploded. “Oh, do you? Well, I expected some standards, too. I expected your darling son not to stick his pecker in the most convenient place. I expected to mean more to him than his schlepping the secretary.”
“Now, now, Eleanor. We’ll have none of that. Blakely is present,” her father said.
“Really? I didn’t see her. Look, Dad, she’s part of this. Don’t think Margaret dreamed this whole thing up all on her own. My daughter is mad I’m dating a man she wanted for herself. Don’t think this is about me dating. It’s who I’m dating.”
“I didn’t want to date Dez, Mom,” Blakely said, tossing her hair over her shoulder, making it understood exactly what she wanted to do with Dez...at least to Eleanor.
“Blakely’s old enough to know her father cheated on me. That he wasn’t some golden wonder boy who was the victim of some evil woman. He brought what happened on himself,” Eleanor continued.
“How dare you!” Margaret yelped, slamming her coffee cup onto the table. “He did not deserve to die by that floozy’s hand.”
“No, he didn’t. But I was a victim, too, something you conveniently forget. His selfishness took away more than his life. He stole a father from our daughter, and a husband from me. I loved him, but I knew who he was, and he wasn’t some paragon of virtue, so you need to stop treating him as if he was the tragic victim. And I’m not spending my life being a martyr. I’m moving on. Dez is part of that, and I’m sorry none of you like it. But it’s not your life. It’s mine.”
Blakely faced her, tears trembling on her thick brown lashes. Guilt pinged in Eleanor’s stomach, but she squelched it. She meant what she said. Blakely couldn’t stir up trouble and not expect to hear the truth. “Mom, it’s not just your life. You know that.”
“It is my life. I’ve spent the past twenty years—hell, the past thirty-nine years—trying to please everyone but myself.”
She gave her parents her attention. “First I worked to earn your love and acceptance. But I never was as good as the students whose pictures you strung up and down the school’s hallways. I did everything I could, but it was never enough.”
She shifted her gaze to Margaret. “And then I met Skeeter. I thought he was the sun and the moon, but he was just a man. I made gourmet dinners, raised his daughter, ever mindful of the Theriot standards. I worked out so I was thin, smiled when signaled and mastered the art of conversation so I could be the epitome of a politician’s wife. And look what it got me.
“And then I worked to be the perfect mother,” she said to Blakely, “with homemade cookies sent on snack day, clean uniforms for soccer and late nights finishing up school projects.
“The only thing that belonged to me was the Queen’s Box. I didn’t even belong to me.” Eleanor thumped her chest. It was dramatic and over the top, but she meant it. “I feel empty and ashamed I spent so much time trying to be someone else.”
Margaret cleared her throat. “We understand everyone has shortcomings and feels insignificant. Even I have times when I doubt myself.”
“Do you?” Eleanor asked, shaking her head. “I’m glad to know you’re human, because I’ve always wondered.”
Margaret narrowed her eyes.
“I don’t appreciate your attempt to meddle in my life, and I don’t give a goddamn what you think about me, Dez and our relationship.”
“Really, Eleanor Grace, must you use such language?” her mother asked.
“Yes,” Eleanor said, “I must. Because I mean it. This is my life. Mine. If I want to marry Dez, I will. If