Don't Forget to Write: A Novel(73)

I beamed at her.

“You’re going to give her a big head,” Ada said.

The corners of Lillian’s mouth twitched up as she turned back to me. “Don’t you believe a word your aunt says. She’s the one who told me you were a natural storyteller after all.”

Ada picked up her newspaper as I grinned down at my plate.

“What time does this young man of yours arrive?” Lillian asked.

“Tonight. But he’s not my young man. We’ve only been on one date.”

“Two,” Ada said from behind her newspaper.

“Well, I’m excited to meet him. It’s so romantic that he came down here to find you after that whole debacle.”

“They’re a good fit,” Ada said, her face still hidden.

“Where is he staying?” Lillian asked.

Ada lowered the newspaper, and they both looked at me. “Uh . . . I assume at the Princeton again.”

Lillian shook her head with a tsk-tsk sound. “Well, that won’t do, will it? He’ll stay here.”

“Here?” I asked.

“Of course,” Lillian said, a twinkle in her eye. “As long as you two can stay in your own rooms at night.”

Ada let out an actual snort at that. I dropped my fork, staring at her open-mouthed.

“Close your mouth,” Ada said. “You look like a fool.” She looked at Lillian. “Are we sure that’s wise? Marilyn isn’t exactly the epitome of virtue.”

I could feel my cheeks flushing.

Lillian smirked. “Were you? At that age?”

Ada was trying not to smile. “At that age? Yes. You, on the other hand . . .”

“Europe was interesting,” Lillian said to me. She turned back to Ada. “And I married him after all.”

“Yes, well, we didn’t all have that option.”

“Can I hear that story?” I asked.

“Absolutely not,” Ada said.

I tried to picture her at thirty years old, having an affair with a soldier during a war. Then pieces of a puzzle fell into place. My eyes widened. “Ada—did you have an affair with Ernest Hemingway?”

Both women looked at me as if I had grown a second head. “With whom?”

Lillian laughed. “The bell tolls.”

“He was an ambulance driver in the war—you were a nurse. That’s basically the plot of A Farewell to Arms. You have a house in Key West—so did he. And you said you met the Fitzgeralds. You had an affair with Hemingway, didn’t you?”

Ada shook her head. “You have some imagination, I’ll give you that. No. It wasn’t Hemingway.”

“Come on—there’s no way you didn’t cross paths with him with all that in common.”

She shrugged. “If I did during the war, I wouldn’t know. He wasn’t Hemingway then. He was just a kid driving an ambulance.”

“Yeah . . . I’m not buying it.”

Ada shook her head. “Suit yourself,” she said. But she winked at Lillian, who wouldn’t quite make eye contact with me.

I tried to remember if I had seen any Hemingway books when I had been in her room, but nothing stood out. I decided I was going to sneak in and look again the next time she left the house. His writing would definitely not be her style, so if they were there, it was evidence enough.

And even if it wasn’t true, the story in my head was too good. I wouldn’t use Hemingway himself, but the aunt’s wartime affair was absolutely going to find its way into my book somehow.





CHAPTER FORTY-SIX


Lillian and Ada kept up a running commentary while I prepared for dinner with Dan.

“She’s wearing the fuchsia dress,” Lillian called down the hall after peeking into my room.

“Tell her the dark green is better,” Ada yelled back.

“Don’t yell room to room,” I shouted.

Lillian laughed, and I heard Ada’s footsteps. “I don’t know why I tolerate that sass.”

“Yes, you do,” Lillian said. “She’s just like you.”

I ducked my head. It was a compliment I would take even if I’d pretend not to. “Only about a million years younger.”

“Watch it,” Ada said mildly, coming to sit on my bed. “And change into the dark green.”

“I like the fuchsia.”

Ada made a face.

“What’s wrong with the fuchsia?” I asked.

“Nothing,” she said, reaching into the pocket of her dress. “But it’d clash with this.” She held out the Guerlain lipstick.

I stared at her for a moment before I reached for it, but she pulled it back. “The green,” she insisted. “You can’t wear red lips with a fuchsia dress.”

Reaching up to undo the zipper, I stripped out of the pink, hung it carefully in the closet, and pulled out the dress she preferred. Once it was on, I went to the mirror. She was right, of course. It brought out the green in my eyes and was a much better choice. I turned around—they were both sitting on my bed now, Sally between them—and held out my hand. Ada placed the lipstick in my palm, and I looked in the mirror to apply it.

“Ada, how did you know I took it before?”

“I didn’t.”