together, and made a jabbing motion in the air. “So stuffed up on herself, that woman, honest to good God. And he took offense! He took offense, and then he said, Well, Olive, your friends are rather provincial. He said that. He said that they never asked him about himself—God, what a male thing to say!—and that he found them to be pro-vin-ci-al. And I told him what was provincial was the fact that he cared that his daughter is gay—that he should be ashamed about calling anyone provincial when he feels that way, I said it’s more than provincial, Mr. Harvard Smarty Pants, it puts you right back in the Dark Ages. I got so furious that I got into the car and drove, and do you know where I thought I was driving to? Home! I thought I was going to drive back to where I used to live with Henry, and it took me a few minutes to realize that that house isn’t even there anymore. So I drove out to the Point, and I sat in the car, and I bawled like a baby, and then I drove back to Jack’s house, well, our house, I suppose, and— Here’s the thing. He was waiting for me, and he felt terrible. He felt awful that he had said those things.
“And I had been thinking about it on the drive back to the house, and I realized I’m a peasant and Jack is not. I mean, it’s a class thing. So when I got back and saw that he was so sorry, I told him that, the business about this being a class thing, very calmly, and do you know? We must have talked for two hours straight, we just talked and talked, and he said he was kind of a peasant too, and that’s why he was so sensitive about people being provincial, because all his life he had deep down felt provincial, and he didn’t want to be. He said, I’m a snob, Olive, and I’m not proud of that. His father was a doctor, you know, outside of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and I thought that was hardly being a peasant, but his father was a general practitioner with an office in the back of their rather small house, and Jack said he felt like he never fit into the school there, and then his first wife, Betsy, well, she was to the manor born, she was from Philadelphia, a Bryn Mawr girl—”
Olive stopped talking. Then she said, “Well, we had a wonderful talk, is what happened.”
“I’m glad,” Cindy said. “But, Olive, what do you mean, you’re a peasant?”
“Well, I mean, I am not all la-di-da. My father never graduated from high school, though my mother was a teacher. But we were small-time people, and I’m proud of it. Now you better tell me something,” Olive said.
So Cindy told Olive that her hair should start coming back within a month. It would look like fuzz for a while, but then it would come back, and Olive looked at her with interest, nodding slightly.
Then Olive said, “Say, I’ve been meaning to ask. What about your sisters, Cindy? What happened to them? Didn’t you have a sister? Or two?”
Cindy was surprised that Olive remembered. She said, “Yes. One of them lives in Florida. She’s a waitress. And my little sister died many years ago—” Cindy hesitated, then said, “Of a drug overdose.” She added, “She’d had issues for years.”
Olive Kitteridge looked at her, and after a moment she gave a small shake of her head. “Godfrey,” she said. She crossed her ankles, turning her rump slightly on the chair. “Well, then I guess they don’t come and see you.”
“My sister-in-law comes. Anita. Honestly, Olive? She’s the only person other than you who has come to see me consistently.”
“Anita Coombs,” Olive said. “Sure, I know who she is. Works in the town clerk’s office.”
“That’s right.”
“Nice person. She always seemed that to me.”
“Oh, she’s wonderful,” said Cindy. “Boy, she has some problems. But who doesn’t?” And then Cindy sat up straighter, and she said, “Olive, did you tell me about that fight you had with Jack Kennison because you think I’m going to die?”
Olive looked at her with what seemed to be genuine surprise. After a moment she said, crossing her ankles the other way, “No, I told you because I’m an old woman who likes to talk about herself, and there was really no one else I felt