Coffee Klatch (eBook)

A Novel

Lorrie McCabe (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2024 | 1. Auflage
306 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-5779-2 (ISBN)

Infos

COFFEE KLATCH begins in 1950 as the story of five young women (all wives of American World War II veterans) living in their mass-produced homes on the same remote street in the recently established Levittown New York. Norma Lewis, Anna Marino, Jane Flynn, Betty Carter, and Ella Schmidt are as different as their new houses on Strong Lane are identical. Norma, glamorous and secretive, hides behind her witty remarks. Level-headed and compassionate, Anna becomes the block's peacemaker. Spontaneous Jane is the group's never-say-die cheerleader. And although the narrow-minded Betty and the reserved Ella are both war brides (one from England and the other from Germany), their personalities couldn't be further apart. At first, the women form an unlikely alliance as suburban pioneers who initially just meet for coffee and companionship. Eventually, through transformative experiences and shared milestones, the five grow closer and encourage each other to find ways to transition from, as Jane puts it, 'young newlywed ninnies' to evolved individuals. However, when one neighbor uncovers another's shocking skeleton-in-the-closet, a feud begins, and the others are forced to take sides. Will the five be able to reunite during the subsequent challenging decades leading up to the town's fiftieth anniversary? Using shifting point-of-view chapters, COFFEE KLATCH is a nostalgic tale that speaks to the importance of female friendship and empowerment. Sometimes, your oldest friends really are your dearest friends.

Lorrie McCabe grew up in Levittown, New York. After raising a family in another Long Island community, she and her husband retired recently to Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Always an enthusiastic reader, especially of women's fiction, this novel represents her first attempt at writing something larger than an undergraduate capstone project.

Textauszug

Chapter 1

Ella - 1950

At two o’clock, there was only a scant breeze carrying the muggy May air. Ella felt a trickle of sweat beginning to roll down between her shoulder blades as she nervously joined the women in her neighbor’s side yard. Immediately, she realized she should not have worn her best day dress with its cinched waist and crinolines, her newest pair of nylons and sling-back pumps. The hostess, Jane Flynn, was wearing pedal pushers, a sleeveless blouse and ballerina flats. The other three were equally casual with loose-fitting dresses and bare legs. Besides being physically uncomfortable, Ella felt uneasy and very much an outsider among these four women with their confident, fast-talking New York accents.

The group represented all the families who were Ella’s new neighbors, and she knew it was kind of Jane to include her at this gathering of homemakers. Their street, Strong Lane, with its five cookie-cutter, Cape Cod-style homes, was a short block connecting two longer roads. Located south of the major thoroughfare of Hempstead Turnpike, all their homes had been erected in 1948 as part of a huge assembly line system established the previous year by Levitt and Sons.

William Levitt was president of Levitt and Sons, a residential construction company that had been started by his father. William, a returning World War II veteran, had keenly observed the need for affordable housing for returning GIs. He bought tracts of Long Island farmland that had failing potato crops in an area known as Island Trees, and he began constructing small, mass-produced homes. These first Cape Cods were rented to veterans with an option to buy the home after the first year. Ella and her husband, John Schmidt, had recently bought their corner home on Strong Lane when the original GI renter opted not to purchase it.

Ella had learned previously from Jane that she, her husband, Danny Flynn, and the other three families on the block were all the original renters who had moved in as the first tenants in 1948 and subsequently bought their homes after the first year. Anna and Sal Marino lived on the other side of the Flynns, two houses down from Ella and John. Norma Lewis and her husband Gordon were located directly across the street from Jane. And the Carters, Betty and Bob, lived opposite the Marino house and next to the Lewises. Adjacent to the Lewises’ house and directly across the street from Ella’s home was a fenced-enclosed neighborhood sump, a deep pit designed to collect storm water through absorbent soils into the groundwater. Each of the women’s homes was located on 6,000 square feet of land. Although the houses were identical on the inside with four rooms and an unfinished attic, the exteriors of the five Cape Cods were slightly different. The size, number and placement of the front windows varied as well as the colors of the synthetic shingles and shutters. There were no garages and no basements. The homes were built on concrete slabs containing radiant heating coils.

As Betty, Jane, Anna, and Norma chatted, Ella noted the four were quite comfortable with each other, having lived together on Strong Lane for almost two years. Next, Ella observed all five of them appeared to be of a similar age: early twenties. She noticed that only Betty was her own diminutive height of five feet, but that was where their physical similarities ended. Betty was as stout as Ella was petite, and her brunette hair was tightly permed whereas Ella’s own straight fair hair was arranged in a small chignon. Ella also thought Betty had the loveliest peaches and cream complexion she had ever seen.

Ella guessed Anna and Jane to be about the same height, a few inches taller than her and Betty. Anna, full-figured and olive-skinned with naturally curly dark hair cut into a short style, was a sharp contrast to slender Jane, who had longer, reddish-blonde tresses and a fair complexion with a smattering of light freckles across the bridge of her nose. Anna, who upon introduction gave Ella a warm hug, seemed serene and kind; a woman, Ella theorized, I can truly connect with. Jane was bouncy and energetic; more spirited than me, Ella surmised.

The tallest and most glamorous of the group was willowy Norma. When everyone moved inside to Jane’s kitchen, a confident Norma scooted past Betty and sat down next to Ella at the chrome and Formica table. Timidly perched on a modern dinette chair with a turquoise vinyl seat pad, which only made her sweat even more, Ella quietly observed her seatmate. She admired Norma’s even-toned, flawless skin, stylishly cut chestnut hair and slightly hooded green eyes. Her five-and-a-half-foot frame boasted the best figure of all the women, and even though she was wearing a casual shift dress, it fit her perfectly. Her bare legs were shapely, and, after Norma slipped off her shoes, Ella noticed the same blood-red nail polish that had been expertly painted on her fingernails was applied on her toenails as well. Norma was the only one who stuck out her pinky finger when she picked up her coffee cup delicately to sip the hot brew.

Listening to the din of conversation, Ella soon realized that these women all had quite different personalities as well. Betty, it appeared, was the gossip of the group and was earnestly talking about the couple who had recently moved out of Ella’s house.

“I don’t care what you say, I always thought Ted and Alice Martin were a bit hoity-toity. Of course, they couldn’t buy the little cape cod like we all did. They had to have a brand-new Levitt ranch with a fireplace and carport. Those homes cost more money, too. And they still have the same four rooms. Now I ask you ladies, is that worth the extra pounds?”

“Dollars, darling,” interjected Norma dryly while inspecting one of her lacquered nails. “You are not in England anymore. And from what I hear, the new models are being sold for around eight thousand.” She lifted her gaze, shrugged her shoulders, and added, “It’s not that huge of a difference from what we paid for our homes. And in addition to the fireplace and carport, Levitt is throwing in a twelve-and-a-half-inch television.”

Betty, talking with her mouth full of Jane’s homemade crumb cake, pointed out, “Well, those ranch owners are getting the same size loo as we have in our homes, so Alice isn’t any better than us.”

“She never thought she was better. And we call it a bathroom, not a loo. You are showing your English side again, Bets,” drawled Norma, and then, turning to Ella, she sarcastically clarified, “Betty Carter, born and raised in merry old England as Elizabeth James, met her very sweet American husband, Bob, when he was stationed during the war at an English air base near her family home. They met at some dreary local dance and dated throughout the war. At least that’s how her back story was described in our infamous local newspaper article. Isn’t that correct, Bets?”

“Gee whiz, Nor,” interjected Jane, clearly annoyed. “Let’s not bring up that newspaper incident again!”

Ella noted the color rising in Betty’s fair face. She was perplexed over the ‘newspaper incident’ but she could see there was some friction between Betty and Norma.

Before Betty could counterpoint, Anna calmly changed the subject. “I will miss Alice. I hope she comes back to this side of town to visit us. But now we have a new friend in Ella. Why don’t you tell us a little about yourself?”

All eyes at the cramped kitchen table turned to look expectantly into Ella’s anxious blue ones. She silently gulped and clasped her shaking hands together in her lap. However, before she could speak, one of the two babies, each situated in their own mosquito-netted carriage under a tiny newly planted tree in the side yard outside Jane’s kitchen door, began to fuss. Betty’s four-month-old, Robert Junior, and Anna’s newborn daughter, Susan, had both been sleeping since the start of the group’s meeting. The only other homemaker who had a child was Jane. Her two-year-old, Pamela, was quietly playing with her dolls on the floor of the living room next to the kitchen.

Anna leaped out of her seat to check on the babies, but Betty declared, “I’ll go. That’s Robby fussing. I recognized his cry. He probably lost his binky. I’ll be back in a flash.”

“So, Ella, I understand from Jane you’re from Germany,” prompted Norma, re-crossing her legs, and turning towards Ella. “That’s fascinating. Tell us more, sweetie.”

“Ja... I mean yes. I am from Berlin originally, but, when I was eleven years, my mother and I were evacuated out of the city because of the bombing. We stayed with my mother’s cousin and her husband at their farm in the country until the war ended,” explained Ella nervously in her lightly German-accented English. She suddenly wondered if any of them would resent her foreign nationality, and at that thought, her anxiety increased.

“Did you have any brothers or sisters? What about your father?” asked Jane. “I come from a big extended family from the Bronx, the O’Briens. I can’t imagine a family consisting of just a mother and daughter.”

“I had two older brothers killed in the war, as was my father. My mother died of complications from measles a few months before the war ended,” said Ella without elaborating. The details of her life during and immediately...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 30.7.2024
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-5779-2 / 9798350957792