Page 47 of The Lonely Hearts Book Club

“Maisey, maybe we should save this for another time,” Greg suggested. I didn’t know when or how he’d managed to crouch in front of me, but he was there and clasping my hands between his. His palms were so enormous that I couldn’t even see the tips of my fingers. “I’ll walk you home.”

“No.” I didn’t yank my hands out of his, but I didn’t get up to leave, either. I liked it here—in this chair and in this house, even in the path of Arthur’s annoyed stare. It was far better than what waited for me back home.

Nothing. What waited for me at home was nothing.

That was the thing I’d been avoiding for years, the thing that Bella recognized as soon as she’d grown old enough to see me for who I really was. I was a woman without hobbies or friends, who talked to strangers on the phone all day—not to help them withtheirproblems, but so I could hear the sound of another human being’s voice. For a while there, I got to be Bella’s mom, and that was enough to hold up the pretense of more. As long as I was busy and active inherlife, I could ignore the fact that I wasn’t busy or active in my own.

“You don’t understand the book,” I said with a misty smile. “Not really. Not the way it’s supposed to be understood.”

“Now, see here,” Arthur sputtered.

“Let her finish,” Sloane said.

“Maisey, you don’t have to do this.” Greg’s voice was the quietest and therefore the most powerful. I fixed my gaze on his and smiled to show I meant no harm.

“Except I do,” I said. I peeked over his shoulder to where Sloane and Arthur were starting to show serious signs of alarm. “I know I’m not as literary as you two, but I still know things. Iseethings.”

I laughed then, a crack in the facade that escaped before I could stop it.

“Actually, that’s not true. I don’t see things—not the things that matter. That’s what I mean when I say it’s a tragic love story. Because Stevensdidlove his boss. More than anyone else in the whole world. More than any person should love another living being.”

My grip on the book loosened. It fell to the floor with a thump, but I didn’t make a move to grab it. I didn’t need it anymore—or ever again. I had no idea how Arthur had studied those pages for several decades and never gotten to the real heart of the story. It just went to show how useless some of these deep book discussions could be. All the literary devices in the world weren’t of any use if you’d never known what it meant to love someone the way that butler had.

Purely. Deeply.Selfishly.

Because that was what his love was at its core—selfish. Stevens didn’t love his employer for who he really was. Hepretendedhe did, pretended so hard that he closed himself off to everything and everyone else in his life.

I saw the same thing in my clients all the time. Mr. Davidson was a prime example. Heknewhe’d never find true love until he shook off the years of self-doubt and self-satisfaction, made a real effort to turn himself into someone worth loving. But he was too far in it now. To admit he needed to change, to dig in and actually upend his life would mean admitting that the last fifty-three years had been wasted. He couldn’t do that any more than Stevens the butler could.

Or me. I couldn’t do it, either.

I reached my hand up to my cheek, surprised when my fingers came away wet.

“Maisey?”

Sloane was starting to sound really worried, so I tried for a smile and an explanation.

“She’s been leaving me for years,” I confessed. Her name stuck in my throat but I managed to get it out anyway. “My Bella. My daughter. I knew it was coming—of course I knew it—but I needed her too much to admit it.”

“I’m sure she needs you, too,” Sloane said. She was on the floor next to Greg, a white square of cloth in her hand. “Teenagers are tough, but you’ll get through this. You both will.”

“That’s sweet of you to say, but it’s a lie.” I smiled mistily at her and accepted the handkerchief. Her initials were hand-embroidered in one corner next to a delicate pink rose. Bella’s favorite flower—or so I always thought. For all I knew, she only liked dandelions now. “The poor thing. I never understood her the way she wants to be understood. Only the wayIwanted to. Does that make sense?”

“No,” Sloane said, but I could see Arthur watching me closely, his head bobbing slowly up and down. I latched onto that like it was my lifeline—likehewas my lifeline.

“I poured so much of myself into her that there’s nothing left now. Just a frumpy housewife who talks too much and thinks too little, an empty shell of a woman no one wants and even fewer people need.”

“Greg, can’t wedosomething? She’s starting to shake.”

“We can let her finish.”

“Don’t worry,” I said as I began picking at the edges of the needlepoint rose with my fingernail. A stray end came loose. I gave it a heartless tug, watching as it disappeared into a long pink thread. “I’ll be fine, just like the butler from the book will be fine. Not happy, obviously, but that’s the whole point.”

“Of the book?” Sloane asked.

I nodded to show she was exactly right.

“I gave her the very best I had to give, and now…” I let my voice trail off, unable to say the rest, but that was okay. The nice thing about having literary friends was that they already knew.