“After Andy, I decided it was okay to be alone, but that could land me in assisted living, no longer working, and wearing a falling alarm. It made me suddenly question everything I’ve done, and where I’m heading. It’s premature, but she seems to think I belong there now. I need to take control of my life again, and I just wanted to double back and make sure I had made the right decisions. I’ve been fine with being alone for all these years because I assumed that I could work forever, do what I wanted, live where I wanted, and take care of myself. Deanna is sure I can’t. It was a pretty horrifying realization. I needed to be alone to think about it and decide what I believe and what I want to do about it.”
“And what are you thinking now?” His heart ached while he listened to her, and he felt sick at what his sister had done, and how she’d handled it. Maddie hadn’t had a stroke, she had broken her ankle. She wasn’t dying, and she certainly wasn’t senile or feeble and failing in any way, but Deanna had made their mother feel that way, and doubt herself and fear for her future. It was almost abusive, and his sister had the delicacy of a bull elephant.
“I calmed down while I was driving,” Maddie said, “and I realized that I’m still me and she can’t make me do what I don’t want to. I’m still of sound mind and body. I’m fifty-eight years old, not a hundred. There are plenty of photographers who have worked into their nineties, and I want to be one of them. I love my house and I’m not moving. If I need assisted living one day, I’ll figure it out then, but I hope I won’t. I know lots of old people who still live in their homes. And I’m not old yet, or not as old and helpless as Dee thinks, or wants to believe. I’m not falling apart because I broke my ankle. She had me running scared for a while, but I’m not scared anymore. Yes, I’ll get old one day, but I’m not there yet. And I’m not afraid to be alone. I made the right decisions for me.
“When I saw the men I had cared about, I realized I’d been right all along. I don’t need a man with no soul or integrity who’d sell himself for a plane, or a guy who can’t keep his hands off every woman who walks past him. And as much as I loved Andy, he was never the right man for me. Even if he’d been alive when I got to the ranch, he doesn’t belong in New York any more than I belong in Wyoming, and neither of us ever did. If I get old alone, it’s okay. It’s a choice I made because the right situation never came along, and the one I have works well for me.
“I’m not moving into assisted living just because I’m not married, or selling my house because Deanna doesn’t like my stairs and her high heels get caught in them. It’s my life and my house, I’ve made my own decisions. I’m not going to give up my work, or sit around waiting to die wearing an alarm now, because I’m going to get old one day. When I do, I’ll deal with it, but I hope it’s a long time off. And I’m not going to grab the nearest man so I don’t end my life alone. If I am alone, then that’s okay. It took me a while to figure it all out again. She had me panicked, but now I’m fine.”
She had come full circle back to where she’d been at the beginning, only her resolve had been strengthened. “I haven’t spoken to Deanna since I left New York two weeks ago, and I didn’t want to. She had me on the run. And none of these decisions are hers to make, they’re mine, until I truly can’t make them anymore. She even suggested I had Alzheimer’s. Your sister is not the most tactful person I know.” She still looked upset about her older daughter, and Ben agreed with her. His mother’s thinking processes and the conclusions she’d come to were entirely reasonable. The one who wasn’t was Deanna, and Ben intended to point that out to her again, after listening to his mother work her way through it. The trip had done her a world of good, and he was glad for her, and sorry that Deanna had upset her.
“I’m sorry you had to go through all that, Mom. Deanna should be horsewhipped.”
“Sometimes it’s good to take stock and make sure you’re on the path you want to be on. I am. And it was kind of fun seeing Bob and Jacques again.” She almost giggled as she said it, and Ben laughed. “I’m so damn glad I didn’t marry either of them. It would have been a huge mistake. I was right the first time, and about Andy too. If I’d seen him, I’m sure I would have felt the same way about him. I really loved him, and I’m sad he’s gone now. I’d have loved to see him again, for old times’ sake, but I wasn’t confused when I made the decision to leave him. I did it for the right reasons. Not everyone you love is the right person to marry. He wasn’t for me. I do get lonely sometimes, but I’m better off alone, enjoying my life and work, and all of you when you have time to see me, than married to the wrong person. I don’t need a man to protect me, or to keep me from feeling old.”
“I want to see more of you, Mom. I’ve been remiss about it. I promise I’m going to do better in the future. That really is my fault.” It was even more his wife’s, Maddie realized, but she didn’t want to say it to him.
“I know how busy you are. You all are,” she said, gently touching his hand. “That’s how it should be. It’s up to me to keep myself busy and engaged.”
“You shouldn’t have to fill every minute of your life with work, you have a family.” He was going to talk to Deanna about that too. And Milagra, no matter how weird she was, could make an effort too. Because one day they truly would no longer have their mother, and she had been good to them for all their lives, much better than they were to her. Instead of pushing her into assisted living with a geriatric alarm, Deanna should go to lunch with her sometime, or invite her to dinner or for a weekend. Assisted living was the right solution for some people, but not for a woman Maddie’s age, at the height of her career, in good health, and with all her faculties as clear as a bell. And the idea that she had Alzheimer’s was ridiculous.
“In a way, maybe it’s lucky I broke my ankle. It started such an avalanche that I reevaluated my whole life, and that’s never a bad thing.”
“It was unnecessary,” he said bleakly.
“I would never have seen my past loves again, and that was a good thing too. When I get back to New York, I’m going to be so happy to be in my house, on my own, and doing whatever I damn please.” She grinned at him. “And if Deanna shows up uninvited again, I’m locking the door in her face. She’s welcome when I say she is, and for the moment that’s not the case.”
“I don’t blame you, Mom. She says whatever she wants to all of us. She needs to watch her mouth in the future, and I’m going to tell her that myself. She can’t run roughshod over you. She needs to respect you and where and how you choose to live. You’re perfectly capable of deciding that for yourself.” He suspected it was why Milagra communicated so little with them. Deanna had always been tough on her, and Milagra didn’t want to deal with it. So she had closed the door on all of them and become a recluse. And if that was who she was, it was okay for her to be different, and even weird. It worked for her. She had done well for herself, to the degree she could. Ben’s assistant was addicted to her books.