Thursdays at Eight

Thursdays at Eight
Debbie Macomber

Perfect for fans of Maeve Binchy' - CandisEvery Thursday at eight, four women meet to talk and share their lives.As one life-changing year unfolds it becomes a true celebration of friends helping each other through the tough times. Having just suffered a heartbreaking divorce, Clare is bitter and angry. Then she learns some devastating news about her ex-husband. Elizabeth, in her late fifties, is recently widowed and finds herself back in the dating game. And that means putting the past behind her.Twenty-something Karen is desperate to be an actress – if only her parents didn’t want her to be more like her respectable sister. Julia is turning forty. Her kids are finally in their teens and she’s just started her own business. Now she finds out that she’s pregnant.

Praise for Thursdays at Eight by DEBBIE MACOMBER

“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 (http://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.