She wondered if she was the only person in the world who’d ever had trouble learning to knit and decided that she must be. From the book’s worn pages and tattered binding, she guessed it was something Barb or her customers had used a lot. Obviously the incomprehensible instructions and mystifying black-and-white drawings meant something to them, and just as obviously that meant they must have been far more intelligent and far less klutzy than Libby.
With a sigh, she flipped the book closed. It was, according to its title, a complete and comprehensive guide to knitting, and as far as she could tell, the complete and comprehensive part was true. At the back of the heavy volume there were pictures of different stitch patterns and instructions on how to knit them, written in what looked to be some kind of code. There was a section on the different kinds of knitting needles—a surprise to Libby since she didn’t know there were different kinds of knitting needles—and another on choosing the right yarn for every project. There were chapters on finishing garments and fixing mistakes.
Comprehensive was the name of the game.
As for being a guide, Libby was pretty certain two-dimensional drawings designed to teach her a three-dimensional skill weren’t going to guide her anywhere but to frustration.
So far it was the only thing about knitting she was good at.
“Mom! You said this was going to be easy.” Meghan’s anguished cry pretty much echoed the words that were bouncing through Libby’s head. Meghan, though, was not talking about knitting. Libby looked up just in time to see her daughter come through the dining room dragging two very full black garbage bags. “It doesn’t look like there’s much junk in there. Until you start digging through it all. There was tons of paper in that cabinet against the wall. And there was plenty of yarn piled in those baskets in there. What do you want me to do with this junk?”
At breakfast they’d discussed their cleaning and organizing strategy over muffins from the nearby bakery shop, but she wasn’t surprised that Meghan didn’t remember. Even as Libby had listed their tasks room by room, and looked at a calendar to set a schedule so they could have the store cleaned out before the end of summer, she knew Meghan wasn’t listening and knew precisely why. Cleaning out years of clutter from a dusty and dreary yarn shop was not Meghan’s idea of fun.
Libby appreciated the help more than she could say. That was the only thing that made it possible for her to force the knitting-induced aggravation out of her voice. “Is that good junk or bad junk in those bags?” she asked.
Her daughter rolled her eyes. Libby was quickly learning this was an all-embracing expression, a sort of universal language practiced by every teenager on the face of the earth. It could mean anything from You’ve got to be kidding to How could I possibly be this smart when I have a mother who is so dumb? and everything in between.
This time she was pretty certain the expression covered the smart/dumb part of the equation.
Libby massaged her temples with the tips of her fingers. “You remember what we said this morning? If it’s just dusty, there might be something we can do to salvage the yarn. Or maybe we can at least donate it somewhere and take the tax write-off. But if it’s got mouse dirt on it, well, in that case we’re going to have to toss it.”
“This is some kind of sick joke, right? You expect me to check to see if there’s mouse poop on this yarn?” Meghan’s face turned as pale as her white T-shirt. She’d been clutching one garbage bag in each dirty fist and now she dropped them and stepped back. “That’s too disgusting for words! There is no way I’m going to do that. There’s no way I should have to! If I was home—”
“You are home.”
“Oh, yeah, right. I forgot. We left our nice house and our nice neighborhood so we could live in the ghetto. We spend our time looking for mouse poop.”
“Meghan…” Libby made a move to walk around the front counter, but Meghan would have none of it. She backed up another step. If that’s the way Meghan wanted it, Libby wouldn’t violate her space. “Why don’t you take a break? You could go upstairs and—”
“And that’s supposed to make me feel better?”
It was a rhetorical question and Libby knew better than to answer it. Rhetorical questions from testy teenagers meant nothing but trouble.
“Go!” she said instead, and somehow when she shooed Meghan toward the back of the store, she managed to make it look like a casual gesture instead of the ultimate surrender. “I don’t care what you do up there, just do something that will help make it easier when the movers arrive with our furniture next week. I’ll look through the yarn myself and decide what to do with it.”
“Yeah, go right ahead. Have fun looking for mouse poop.”
Meghan’s final comments rang through the store along with the sounds of her footsteps as she stomped up the steps. The last Libby heard from her was the slam of the upstairs door.
“You handled that well,” Libby told herself, the sarcasm as heavy as the bags she grabbed and dragged to the corner of the room. “A few more years of practice and you really ought to know how to screw up a conversation with your daughter.”
The possibilities were too frightening to dwell on, and besides, she didn’t have the time or the energy. Libby went back to the front counter, but there was nothing appealing about trying to knit again. Instead she reached for the legal pad where earlier that day she’d begun a to-do list.
So far not one thing was checked off.
Upstairs
Finish cleaning.
Downstairs
Sort through all yarn and knitting supplies, toss what can’t be saved.
Catalogue and store the rest in moth-proof containers.
Thoroughly clean.
Repair ceiling in dining room.
Paint.
Talk to yarn companies, schedule visits from reps.
Stock shelves.
Talk to bank.
Meet with attorney.
Arrange for advertising.
Plan grand opening.
Set date for soft opening.
Just looking at the list, a thread of panic snaked through her. She beat it back with reason. It would take a lot longer than one morning to make a difference in the disaster that was Barb’s Knits. She and Meghan had made a start, she reminded herself, and if Meghan didn’t want to participate…
She looked up at the ceiling, wondering what her daughter was doing upstairs. Was she busy putting their room in some sort of order or was she up there sulking?
Either way, Libby wasn’t worried. Meghan would eventually realize she’d be more comfortable if the room she and Libby shared looked at least a little like her room had back at home. She’d want her clothes in neat order in her half of the closet and the little bit of makeup Libby allowed her—lip gloss and light pink nail polish—displayed on her dresser.
Sooner or later Meghan would come around. At least Libby hoped she would.
As for Barb’s Knits, that was another matter altogether.
“It won’t come around at all. Not unless I make it come around,” Libby told herself. With that in mind, she’d just started to flip through the calendar to check their cleaning schedule when she heard a bang, a crash and the sound of breaking glass upstairs. All of it was punctuated by Meghan’s high-pitched scream.
Libby’s heart jumped into her throat. She had raced through the store and up the stairs before she realized she was even moving. “Meghan? Meghan, answer me. Are you all right? What happened? What—”
She pushed open the kitchen door and found Meghan standing in the middle of the room,