The Wedding Quilt (16 page)

Nodding, Summer followed her upstairs, where Matt dozed in the rocking chair, a wide-awake James in his arms, and Caroline kicked and wriggled and complained hungrily in the crib. Summer swept Caroline up in her arms and soon had her smiling and cooing, but there were tears in her eyes when she passed the baby along to Sarah to nurse.

For the rest of her visit Summer avoided the kitchen when Jeremy was around, and though she exchanged friendly greetings when they passed in the halls, she never lingered to draw him into conversation.

She returned to Chicago on Saturday, after hugging everyone good-bye and wishing aloud that her spring break had fallen one week later, so she wouldn't miss Bonnie's homecoming from Maui. Judy, too, would be coming for the weekend to celebrate National Quilting Day, and the Elm Creek Quilters were bursting with a surprise for their recently divorced friend: Judy intended to sell her share of Elm Creek Quilts to Bonnie for the same modest price Bonnie had sold her own share to Anna in order to protect it from her now ex-husband, Craig.

Sarah and Summer never again spoke of Summer's bewildering, uncharacteristic behavior, and over time, Sarah resolved to pretend it had never happened. No true harm was done, and some small good did come of it. One day in early June, Anna and Sarah were taking the twins for a walk in their double stroller when the subject of a new course Gwen wanted to teach came up. Talk of Gwen led to talk of her daughter, and Anna wondered aloud when Summer might visit again, adding that Summer's overly friendly behavior toward Jeremy during her last visit had bothered her quite a lot at the time, but in hindsight she was glad for it.

“Glad?” Sarah echoed. If someone flirted with Matt right in front of her, she would be furious. Fortunately, Matt was rather oblivious to flirtation, a quality that had slowed their courtship but probably granted him a sort of immunity to trouble now.

“I know it sounds strange, but I am.” Anna stooped over to pick up the shoe Caroline had tugged off her foot and flung from the stroller. “Summer practically threw herself at Jeremy, and he wasn't even tempted. When it came down to it, he chose me.”

Sarah wouldn't have characterized Summer's mild, inadvertent flirting as throwing herself at Jeremy, but since it seemed to comfort Anna to believe that, she let it go. Besides, it was obvious Jeremy and Anna adored each other, and Jeremy had chosen Anna, just as she had said.

When Summer visited for a week between the summer and autumn quarters, time had worked upon the tension lingering among the three, and so their second reunion truly did seem to be that of good friends. Anna's insecurities had dissipated as her relationship with Jeremy had grown, or so it seemed to Sarah, and when Summer and Jeremy discussed their grad school research, the conversation was animated and enthusiastic, as it would have been between any two graduate students intrigued by a historical puzzle. Sarah was proud of her friends, who had handled a delicate situation with sensitivity, generosity, and grace where others might have allowed once treasured friendships to collapse into acrimony.

Summer returned to school, and Elm Creek Manor settled into autumn. As winter loomed, some friends departed for warmer climes until spring, while Matt turned his attention to the apple harvest with the help of his student workers. Sarah cared for her babies and tried not to worry about Melissa, Sylvia's newfound second cousin twice removed. All seemed well that golden autumn, the trees scarlet and gold and brown, a chill in the air, and logs burning on the hearth in the evening.

November arrived, and with it anticipation for Thanksgiving and the special quilter's holiday the Elm Creek Quilters would celebrate the day afterward. That year, as she had done the year before, Sylvia had invited her friends to piece quilt blocks representing whatever they were most thankful for and place them into the cornucopia centerpiece. Sarah would have made a Twin Star block except she didn't want to reuse a pattern she had chosen the year before, so instead she pieced a Home Sweet Home block from red, blue, and tan cottons. She had not realized what blessings peace and contentment within the family were until she had lost and regained them.

As much as she looked forward to their quilter's holiday with its delicious potluck lunch, daylong marathon of quilting, and expressions of gratitude shared around the table, she was even more excited about—and preoccupied by—an event that would begin two days later. On the Sunday after Thanksgiving, Elm Creek Quilts would host the first of what they hoped would become an annual gathering called Quiltsgiving, and although Sarah found the name a bit corny, she loved the concept. A year before, Gretchen had proposed a winter camp during which they and their guests would make quilts for Project Linus, a national organization dedicated to providing love, a sense of security, warmth, and comfort to children in need through the gifts of new, handmade blankets, quilts, and afghans. All volunteers who attended Quiltsgiving would enjoy a week at Elm Creek Manor absolutely free of charge, but rather than working on quilts for themselves, they would make soft, comforting children's quilts for Project Linus. As the inaugural coordinator of the fledgling Waterford chapter, Gretchen had already delivered numerous quilts to the Elm Creek Valley Hospital, where they offered comfort to seriously ill children, and to the fire department, where they warmed youngsters rescued from fires and accidents. Gretchen hoped the first Quiltsgiving would result in many soft, bright, and warm quilts to donate to the local women's shelter, where mothers fleeing dangerous domestic situations were often forced to bring their children with nothing more than the clothes on their backs.

Sarah was determined to help Gretchen make their first Quiltsgiving a resounding success. One day in mid-November, she was working busily in the library while James napped and Caroline played with toys on a quilt spread out on the floor near the desk. Jeremy entered and asked if he could borrow Sylvia's “quilt block book,” as everyone referred to her well-used encyclopedia of traditional quilt blocks.

“Is this for a research paper?” asked Sarah, finding the volume on one of the room's many bookcases and giving it to him.

“It's research,” he said, “but not for a paper.”

Sarah teased him for his evasiveness, but Jeremy merely grinned and escaped with the book without revealing another detail. She suspected she would find out what he was up to eventually.

On the Friday after Thanksgiving, the skies were clear and sunny, with only a trace of frost on the lawn that melted before midmorning—quite a contrast from the previous year's dangerous blizzard. As Sarah prepared her dish for the potluck luncheon feast, she reflected upon their last quilter's holiday and considered how much more than the weather had changed since that momentous day. She had become a mother; Matt had gone away but had returned with promises never to leave her again; Anna and Jeremy seemed more in love every day; Sylvia had been reunited with Elizabeth's descendants; Sarah's precious babies were talking and toddling. She could only imagine what changes the next season would bring.

All morning long, Sarah and her friends quilted in the ballroom. Sarah's mother had come for the holiday weekend, and she was making cozy flannel quilts for the twins, plaid squares alternating with machine-appliquéd, folk art Santa Clauses. Diane, who seemed incapable of planning ahead, was leafing through back issues of
Quilters Newsletter
looking for inspiration for a Christmas ornament exchange she had signed up for through her church.

“How many ornaments are you supposed to make?” Gwen inquired.

Diane didn't look up from her magazine. “Why do you want to know?”

“Just curious. It's a natural question. You say you're participating in an ornament exchange, and I ask how many ornaments you need to make.”

“Twenty-five.”

“Twenty-five?” exclaimed Agnes. “But you told me they're due a week from tomorrow!”

Agnes's revelation evoked exclamations of surprise, sympathy, and amusement from the circle of quilters, and laughter from Gwen. “How do you expect to finish them in time?” asked Carol.

Sylvia looked up from hand-piecing another arc for the reproductions of Elizabeth's Double Wedding Ring quilt to study Diane over the rims of her glasses. “I hope you aren't thinking of exchanging something you've slapped together at the last minute for the lovely ornaments your friends have likely spent weeks laboring upon.”

“No,” said Gwen. “She'll choose something complicated to show off, finish half of them on her own, then throw herself upon Agnes's mercy and beg her to finish the other half.”

“And this,” Diane said to Agnes, “is why I told you about the deadline in the car rather than announce it in front of everyone else.”

When Agnes bit her lower lip guiltily, Gwen laughed and said, “Diane, don't you dare blame your failure to meet your responsibilities upon Agnes. It's her job as your friend to keep you honest.”

“I'm not blaming her,” Diane protested, “and I haven't failed to meet my responsibilities yet. Eight days is plenty of time to make twenty-five simple ornaments.” She took another magazine from the stack and added in an undertone, “As long as I find a pattern soon.”

Sarah, who respected the value of planning ahead as much as Diane disdained it, was busy cutting squares from light fabrics and brightly colored novelty prints to sew into nine-patch quilts during Quiltsgiving the following week. Later that afternoon, Anna was going to give her another lesson on the long-arm sewing machine they had purchased a few months before. Anna and Gretchen, who had used the enormous quilting machines while working in quilt shops before they joined Elm Creek Quilts, were the most experienced long-arm operators on the faculty. In the few weeks that they had been available, their one-on-one workshops had quickly become the most sought-after classes on the camp schedule.

Sarah had cut enough pieces for two twin-size quilts by lunchtime, when the Elm Creek Quilters, the resident husbands, and their guests gathered in the banquet hall for what Agnes called their “Patchwork Potluck” feast. As a rule, every dish had to be made from leftovers from their family Thanksgiving feasts the day before. Agnes always said no meal was better suited for quilters, who could be trusted to find creative, delicious uses for leftover turkey, stuffing, and vegetables just as they created beautiful and useful works of art from scraps of fabric.

When the table was set but before they took their seats, the Elm Creek Quilters and Carol placed their folded quilt blocks into the cornucopia centerpieces, taking elaborate precautions to prevent their friends from seeing what they had made. As they had done the previous year, the men contributed pieces of fabric scavenged from the women's scrap bag—except for Jeremy. When Andrew kidded him about lacking sufficient courage to face the challenge, Jeremy said casually, “Oh, I put mine in first, before the rest of you got here.”

In later years, Sarah would remember the Home Sweet Home block she had contributed and the California block Sylvia had made in honor of her newfound relatives there, but all the other choices had faded in her memory in contrast to Jeremy's. After the gathered friends had enjoyed their feast, Sylvia reached into the cornucopia, withdrew a block or a piece of fabric, and invited the contributor to share what it represented. Since Jeremy had been the first to place something into the cornucopia, his was the last to be taken out, which Sarah soon realized had been his intention all along.

“Now, what could this be?” said Sylvia as she withdrew a ribbon-tied scroll from the cornucopia. When she promptly handed it to Anna, Sarah knew Sylvia was in on the secret, and whatever it was, they would all know soon.

With a curious glance from Sylvia to Jeremy, Anna untied the bow and unrolled the paper. When she held it up for all to see, Sarah recognized the drawing as a True Lover's Knot block, finely rendered in the style of a nineteenth-century woodcut.

“That's lovely,” said Carol, who did not know the block name. “But what does it mean?”

“Yes, go on,” Sylvia prompted Jeremy, smiling. “Tell us.”

“This is the True Lover's Knot pattern,” said Jeremy. “This year, I'm most thankful for Anna—her goodness, her generosity, her compassion for others, her unique sense of humor—” Several chuckles went up from around the table. “Anna, falling in love with you was like coming home to a place I didn't realize I'd been missing all my life. You're the only person I've ever known who accepts me for who I am, right in this moment, faults and all, and isn't waiting for me to become someone else. You're beautiful and wonderful and kind. I love you, Anna, and if you'll let me, I'd like to spend the rest of my life doing my best to make you as happy as you've made me.”

Her eyes brimming over with tears, Anna looked as if she might speak, but Jeremy wasn't finished. He reached into the cornucopia, and as a soft murmur of joy and expectation went up from the gathered friends, he knelt beside Anna's chair and held up a small, elegant black box. When he opened it, Sarah couldn't see what was inside, but it was easy enough to guess.

“Anna,” he asked as she began to cry, “will you marry me?”

Unable to speak, she nodded. Her hand shook as Jeremy slipped the ring on the third finger of her left hand. They embraced, and the room rang with the sounds of cheers and congratulations.

They married at Elm Creek Manor in March the following spring. At first their families were surprised and concerned that they would have such a brief engagement, but the couple deflected their worries with reminders of how many years they had known each other as good friends before they had fallen in love, and they asked, rhetorically, since they were certain they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together, why not get started? They retained a sense of humor when elderly aunts and gossipy neighbors assumed Anna surely must be pregnant, since time would dispel that rumor soon enough. The most compelling reason for choosing a March wedding date, Anna confided to Sarah and Sylvia when she asked if they could hold the celebration at Elm Creek Manor, was that she didn't want the nuptials to interfere with quilt camp, and neither she nor Jeremy wanted to wait until after Labor Day to begin their new life together.