Thursdays at Eight

“Macomber’s women serve as bedrock for one another in this sometimes tearful, always uplifting tale that will make readers wish they could join this charming breakfast club.”

—Booklist

“Not simply a work of fiction but the culmination of personal experiences that translate into the meaning of life for women in particular and people in general. Friendship—rather, friendships—is what the book is all about. [Macomber] builds on her reputation of giving women readers what they want in the books they read.”

—The Sunday Oklahoman

“Thursdays at Eight is a novel of everyday women confronted with extraordinary circumstances, and Macomber tells their stories with a depth of mature insight that is both compassionate and unfailingly honest. These are women with guts and fortitude, courage and determination, and readers will recognize the same strength of character found in the novels of venerable authors Rosamunde Pilcher and Maeve Binchy.”

—Amazon.com

“As always, Macomber draws rich, engaging characters.”

—Publishers Weekly

Thursdays at Eight

Debbie Macomber

www.mirabooks.co.uk

July 2010

Dear Friends,

Thursdays at Eight was originally published in 2001 and launched my hardcover writing career. I remember how excited I was as I held this book in my hands for the very first time. When I was originally published back in the early 1980s, having my titles appear in hardcover was a dream and, back then, it seemed an impossible one. I’ve learned a great deal about goal-setting since I rented that typewriter all those years ago. Dreams do come true!

Another lesson I learned with this book was that some of the very best story ideas are right under our noses. When I first moved out of my home office and rented space in a commercial building, I found I was making business decisions I felt completely inadequate to make. The one thing I did know was to ask other successful women some key questions. Filled with purpose I invited five women, all business owners and/or entrepreneurs, to my home for tea. The others knew one another on a casual basis but not as friends. We had such a good time we decided to meet every…you got it…Thursday morning for breakfast.

That was seventeen years ago now. Of the five there are three original members. Diana married and moved away. Stephanie, our dear Stephanie, we lost to ovarian cancer. Betty, the bank president, has since retired, and while Lillian continues in her law practice she, too, is looking toward retirement. Sandy O’Donnell joined us a few years ago. I’m still part of the group, too. We meet regularly to encourage, support and inspire one another. Through the past seventeen years we’ve gone through deaths, divorces, marriages, aging and dying parents, major and minor health issues and just about everything else together. We’re the very best of friends and in some ways as close as sisters.

After we started meeting, it was Stephanie who suggested we each take a word for the year. I thought it was a wonderful idea and it was that concept (and, of course, the fact that we met regularly as a group) that inspired Thursdays at Eight. I hope you enjoy this story and that it will inspire you, too.

Enjoy.

P.S. I love hearing from my readers. You can reach me through my Web site at www.debbiemacomber.com and fill out a guest book entry, or write me at P.O. Box 1458, Port Orchard, WA 98366.

This story is dedicated to Lillian Schauer, Betty Roper, Sandy O’Donnell and the memory of Stephanie Cordall. The wonderful, wise and fascinating women of my Thursday morning breakfast group.

Chapter One

CLARE CRAIG

“It’s the good girls who keep the diaries; the bad girls never have the time.”

—Tallulah Bankhead

January 1st

A promise to myself: this year is a new beginning for me. A fresh start, in more ways than one. I’m determined to put the divorce behind me. About time, too, since it’s been final for over a year. Okay, thirteen months and six days to be exact, not that I’m counting…well, maybe I am, but that’s going to stop as of today.

Michael has his new life and I have mine. I’ve heard that living well is the best revenge. Good, because that’s what I intend to do. I’m going to live my life as a successful, happy (or at least, contented) single woman and mother. This is my vow. I will no longer expect another person to provide me with a sense of worth. I don’t need a husband to make me feel complete. It’s been a struggle to let go of the marriage, but holding on to all that pain and anger is getting me nowhere. I’m sick of the pettiness, sick of fighting and sick to death of the resentment, the bitterness. I just never thought anything like this could possibly happen to Michael and me.

I saw divorce mow down marriages all around us, but I somehow thought we were safe…

It didn’t help any that I ran into Marilyn Cody over the Christmas holidays. She hadn’t heard about the divorce, and when I told her my husband had left me for a twenty-year-old—correction, my ex-husband (I still have trouble remembering that)—I could see how shocked she was. Then, apparently thinking she was giving me good advice, Marilyn suggested I find myself a boy toy (or is it toy boy?) to get my confidence back. She was actually serious, as though going to bed with a man only a few years older than my own children would make me feel better. Marilyn is a good example of why I can’t remain friends with the people Michael and I once associated with.

Losing Marilyn as a friend is no great loss, anyway. I read the pitying look in her eyes, and I didn’t miss her innuendo that I could’ve kept my husband if I hadn’t let myself go. It was all I could do not to get in her face and defend myself—as though that would prove anything. As a matter of fact, I happen to weigh within fifteen pounds of what I did at twenty-five, and damn it all, I take care of myself. If anyone’s suffering from middle-age spread, it’s Michael. The audacity of Marilyn to imply that Michael’s affair is somehow my fault!

How the hell was I supposed to compete with a girl barely out of her teens? I couldn’t. I didn’t. Every time I think about the two of them together, I feel sick to my stomach.

The journal-writing class has helped. So did meeting Liz, Julia and Karen. They’re my friends, and part of my new life. Forming a solid relationship with each of these women is one of the positive changes I’ve made. As the saying goes, “Out with the old and in with the new.” I’m glad the four of us have decided to continue seeing each other, even though the class isn’t being offered again. Thursdays for breakfast was an inspired idea.

Writing down my thoughts is the only way I got through the last six months. This should be a good time in my life. Instead, I’ve been forced to start over—not my choice and not my fault! Okay, fine. I can deal with it. I am dealing with it, each and every day. I hate it. I hate Michael, although I’m trying not to. The best I can say at this point is that I’m coping.

I will admit one thing. Michael’s affair has taught me a lot about myself. I hadn’t realized I could truly hate anyone. Now I know how deep my anger can cut…and I wish to hell I didn’t.

My mistake—and I made a few—was in delaying the divorce as long as I did. Eternal optimist that I am, I clung to the belief that, given time, Michael would come to his senses. I was convinced that eventually he’d see how much he was hurting me and the boys. An affair with a twenty-year-old was sheer madness. Surely he’d wake up one morning and realize he’d destroyed his entire life—and for what? Good sex? I doubt she’s that incredible in the sack.

In retrospect, I could kick myself for waiting so many months to see an attorney. I merely postponed the inevitable, because I was so sure he’d admit what he was doing and put an end to it. How I prayed, how I longed for the opportunity to save my marriage. If only Michael would come home again. If only he’d give us another chance. Little did I understand that his actions had utterly destroyed the foundation of our lives together. The minute he told me he’d fallen in love with Miranda (sure he had!), I should’ve hightailed it into a lawyer’s office and set the divorce in motion. Doing that would have saved me a lot of grief.

At a particularly low point, when I was feeling absolutely desperate, I signed up for counseling. The irony didn’t escape me, even then. I wasn’t the one defiling our wedding vows, yet I was the one making appointments with a shrink!

Then, on a particular Thursday morning about a year and a half ago, I got up after another restless, miserable, lonely night. I remember leaning against the bathroom sink in such emotional pain I couldn’t even stand upright. I looked at myself in the mirror and barely recognized my own face. Something happened in those moments. Nothing I can precisely identify, but the experience changed me. The victim disappeared and there I stood, straight and tall, glaring back at my reflection, determined to survive. Michael might want to kill our marriage, but he wouldn’t kill me in the process. In retrospect, I realize that was when I’d reached my limit.

I got dressed and marched myself right down to Lillian Case’s office. If there’s anything to smile about regarding this ugly divorce, it’s the misery Lillian put Michael through. Michael repeatedly claimed he wanted a friendly divorce, but as Lillian said, it was far too late for that.

The boys still aren’t speaking to him. I’m not sure Mick ever will. Alex was always close to his father, and I know he misses Michael. We don’t talk about him. I wish we could, but nothing I can say is going to take away the pain of having their father walk out the door. What Michael failed to understand was that in leaving me, he abandoned his children, too. He didn’t just betray me. He broke faith with us all.

I probably should have figured out what was happening—that was what Marilyn seemed to insinuate. I did suspect something was wrong, but never, ever would I have guessed this. I thought maybe a midlife crisis or boredom with our marriage. Maybe that was how he felt; maybe it’s why he did what he did. But he should’ve been honest with me about his feelings—not had an affair. Bad enough that my husband screwed another woman, but a friend’s daughter?

I can only imagine what Carl would think if he were alive. It’s all so crazy. Just a few years ago, Michael and I attended the party Kathy and Carl threw for Miranda’s high-school graduation. Our top car salesman keels over from a heart attack and Michael, being a caring friend and business-owner, helps the grieving widow with the funeral arrangements and the insurance paperwork. Even crazier is the fact that I actually suggested it.

My one concern at the time was that Michael might be getting too close to the widow. Only it wasn’t Kathy keeping my husband entertained all those nights. It was her twenty-year-old daughter. I don’t think Kathy or I will ever get over the shock of it.

Michael still doesn’t fully appreciate the consequences of what he’s done. He sincerely believed that once we were divorced, everything would return to normal between him and his sons. Mick set him straight on that score. Alex, too. I know Michael hasn’t stopped trying, but the boys won’t be so easily won over. I’ve done my best to stay out of it. Nothing will ever change the fact that he’s their father; how they choose to deal with him is up to them. I refuse to encourage either boy to forgive and forget, but I won’t hold them back from a relationship with Michael, either. The choice is theirs.

Twenty-three years of marriage and I never looked at another man. Damn it all, I was a faithful, loving wife. I could have tolerated an affair if he’d given it up and returned to our marriage. But, no, he—

Okay, enough. I don’t need to keep repeating the same gory details. As I said, this is a fresh start, the first day of a new year. I’m giving myself permission to move on, as my psychobabbling counselor used to put it.

Part of moving on is belonging to the breakfast group—and continuing to write in my journal. Liz suggested we each pick a word for the year. A word. I haven’t quite figured out why, let alone which word would best suit me. We’re all supposed to have our words chosen before we meet next Thursday morning at Mocha Moments.

I’ve toyed with the idea of beginnings, as in new beginnings, but I don’t want to carry that theme around with me for the next twelve months. At some point, beginnings have to become middles and potential has to be realized. I guess I’m afraid I won’t be as successful as I want to be.

What I really need to do is discover who I am, now that I’m single again. For twenty-three years my identity was linked to Michael. We were a team, complementing each other’s strengths and weaknesses. I was always better with finances and Michael was the people person. He took a part-time job selling cars the first year we were married in order to supplement our budget, and quickly became the top salesman. His degree was in ecology and he had a day job at the town planning office but made three times the money selling cars. Soon he was working full-time at the dealership and I was stretching every dollar he made, creating a small nest-egg.

Then we had the chance to buy the Chevrolet dealership—the opportunity of a lifetime. We scraped together every penny we could. By the time the paperwork was finished, we didn’t have a cent between us, but we were happy. That was when we—

I can’t write about that, don’t want to dwell on how happy we were in those early years. Whenever I think about it, I feel overwhelmed by the pain of loss and regret. So much regret…

Word. I need a word. Not memories. I can’t tie my new identity to the past and to who I was; I’ve got to look toward the future. So I need a word that fits who I am today, the woman I’m becoming. The woman I want to be.

Just a minute here. Just a damn minute! Who I was, who I want to be. Why do I have to change? There’s nothing wrong with me! I wasn’t the one who ripped the heart out of this family. I was a good wife, a good mother. I was faithful…

FAITHFUL.

That’s it. My word. Not beginnings, not discovery, but faithful. From the moment I spoke my vows I was faithful to my husband, my marriage, my family. All these years I’ve been faithful to myself; I’ve never acted dishonestly and I’ve always put my family responsibilities above my own desires. I don’t need to find myself. I found out who I am a long time ago and frankly I happen to like that person. I wasn’t the one who changed; Michael did.

This feels good. The burden isn’t on my shoulders to prove one damn thing. I’ll remain faithful to me.

Happy New Year, Clare Craig. You’re going to have a wonderful year. No financial worries, thanks to Lillian Case and a judge who’s seen far too many men mess up their family’s lives. Michael will be spending twenty very long years paying off my share of the dealership. Plus interest. I have the house, a new car every year, health insurance, the boys’ college expenses and enough money to live comfortably.

I don’t have anything to worry about. I can do whatever I want. I certainly don’t have to work if I don’t feel like it.

Hey! Maybe getting a job wouldn’t be a bad idea. Maybe I should put my two decades of experience back into play. Didn’t I recently hear that Murphy Motors was advertising for a general manager? With my experience, I could work any hours I chose. News of my taking that job would really get Michael. It’s what he deserves. Turnabout is fair play (another of those handy sayings). Oh, God, it’s awful of me, but I love it.

This is what I’ve been waiting for. It’s taken a long time to feel anything but horrendous, crushing pain. I’m smiling now, just thinking about the look on Michael’s face when he learns I’ve been hired by his largest competitor.

Marilyn Cody was wrong, but then so was I. Living well isn’t going to teach Michael a thing, is it? Knowing that he’s lying awake at night, worrying about me sharing all his insider secrets with the Ford dealership—now, that will go a long way toward helping me find some satisfaction. And once I’m satisfied, I’ll start to concentrate on living well.

“Mom, can we talk?”

Clare Craig glanced up from her desk to find her seventeen-year-old son standing in the doorway of the family room. They’d spent the morning taking down the Christmas decorations, as they always did on January sixth—Epiphany, Twelfth Night—and getting Mick ready to return to college. How like Michael he looked, she thought with a twinge of sorrow. Michael twenty-five years ago, athletic, handsome, fit. Her heart cramped at the memory.

“I’m not interrupting anything, am I?” Alex stepped inside, dressed in his soccer uniform. The holiday break was already over; school had begun earlier in the week. Mick had left that morning for college in San Francisco.

Clare capped the end of her fountain pen and set aside the checkbook and bills in order to give her younger son her full attention. “What can I do for you?”

Alex avoided her gaze. “We haven’t been talking as much as we used to,” he mumbled, walking slowly toward her desk.

“I’ve been busy.” The Christmas tree had only come down that morning, but she realized he wasn’t referring to the last few days; he meant over the past year.

“I know,” he said with a shrug, his eyes darting around the room. “It’s just that…”

“Is there something you wanted to tell me?”

He raised his head and their eyes briefly met. Reading her younger son had never been a problem for Clare.

“How about if we talk in the kitchen?” she suggested. “You thirsty?”

The hopeful look on his face convinced her to abandon paying the bills. She’d get back to all that later.

“Sure.” He led the way through the large family room and into the kitchen.

Clare loved her expansive kitchen with its double ovens and large butcher-block island. Shining copper pots and kettles dangled from the rack above, the California sunlight reflected in their gleam. Clare had designed the kitchen herself and spent countless hours reviewing every detail, every drawer placement, every cupboard. She’d taken pride in her home, in her skill as a cook and homemaker.

These days it was unusual for her to prepare a meal. Alex had a part-time job at a computer store, and if he wasn’t at school or work, he was with his friends or on the soccer field. Cooking for one person hardly seemed worth the effort, and more and more often she ordered out. Or didn’t bother at all.

“I’ll get us a Coke,” Alex said, already reaching for the refrigerator handle. Clare automatically took two glasses from the cupboard.

Alex placed the cans on the round oak table. Many a night, unable to sleep, the two of them had sat here while Clare sobbed in pain and frustration. Alex had wept, too. It hadn’t been easy for a teenage boy to expose his emotions like that. If Clare didn’t already hate Michael for what he’d done to her self-esteem, then she’d hate him for the pain he’d brought into their children’s lives.

“Mick and I had a long talk last night.”

Clare had surmised as much. She’d heard them in Alex’s bedroom sometime after midnight, deep in conversation. Their raised voices were followed by heated whispers. Whatever they were discussing was between them and she was determined to keep out of it. They needed to settle their own differences.

“He’s upset with me.”

“Mick is? What for?”

Alex shrugged. He seemed to do that a lot these days.

“Brother stuff?” It was what he generally said when he didn’t want to give her a full explanation.

“Something like that.” He waited a moment before pulling back the tab on his soda can and taking a long swallow, ignoring the glass she’d set in front of him.

“Does this have to do with Kellie?” Alex and the girl across the street had been dating for a couple of months. Mick had dated her last summer and Clare wondered if the neighbor girl was causing a problem between her sons.

“Ah, Mom, we’re just friends.”

“If you and your brother had a falling-out, why don’t you just tell me instead of expecting me to guess?”

He lowered his eyes. “Because I’m afraid you’re going to react the same way Mick did.”

“Oh? And how’s that?”

Alex took another drink of his Coke. Clare recognized a delaying tactic when she saw one. “Alex?”

“All right,” he said brusquely and sat up, his shoulders squared. “I’ve been talking to Dad.”

Clare swallowed hard, but a small shocked sound still managed to escape. She felt as though she’d taken a punch to the solar plexus.

“Are you mad?” Alex asked, watching her anxiously.

“It shouldn’t matter what I think.”

“But it does! I don’t want you to feel like I’ve betrayed you, too.”

“I…”

“That’s what Mick said I was doing. First Dad and now me. Mom, I swear to you, it isn’t like that.”

“Michael is your father,” she said, her mind whirling as she struggled with her conflicting emotions. Alex would never intentionally do anything to hurt her. As much as possible, Clare had tried not to entangle her sons in this divorce. When Michael moved out of the family home and in with his underage sweetheart, the two boys had rallied around her as if they could protect her from further pain. It didn’t work, but she’d cherished them for their show of sympathy and support.

“He called…Dad did.”

“When?” Now she was the one avoiding eye contact. She distracted herself by opening the can of Coke and pouring it carefully into her glass.

“Last week at Softline.”

“He phoned you at work?” She shouldn’t have been surprised; Michael was too much of a coward to risk having her answer the phone here at the house. Naturally he’d taken the low road.

“He invited me to dinner.”

“And you’re going?”

Clare felt her son’s scrutiny. “I don’t know yet. Mick doesn’t think I should.”

“But you want to, right?”

Alex stood and paced the area in front of the table. “That’s the crazy part, Mom. I do and I don’t. I haven’t talked to Dad in over a year—well, other than to say I wasn’t going to talk to him.”

“He is your father,” Clare said, to remind herself as much as her son.

“That’s what Kellie said.”

Sure Kellie said that, Clare mused darkly. She hadn’t seen her mother betrayed and then dumped like last week’s garbage. Kellie had two loving parents. She couldn’t even imagine what divorce did to a person’s soul or how it tore a family apart.

“I told Mick and I’m telling you. If my seeing Dad hurts you, then I won’t do it.”

Clare forced a smile but wasn’t sure what to say.

“Kellie thinks I should be talking to Dad,” he said, studying her closely, as though the neighbor girl’s opinion would influence her. Clare wasn’t particularly interested in what Kellie thought, but she knew how difficult the last two years had been for Alex, knew how badly he missed Michael.

“Kellie’s right,” she said briskly. “You and your father should be communicating.”

“You don’t mind?”